From Reuters:

FRANKFURT, June 18 - U.S. retail giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc is considering closing more outlets in Germany, a senior executive said in a newspaper interview published on Sunday.

Wal-Mart has closed three German shops this year and German Chief Executive David Wild told the Welt am Sonntag newspaper he could not rule out further closures.

"We have some markets that are going really well and others where we are losing a lot of money," he was quoted as saying.

"At the moment we are examining all the unprofitable locations. If we decide that in the longer term we cannot run some of these stores profitably, we will close them."

Wal-Mart entered Germany in December 1997 and employs thousands of workers at 85 stores across the country. It recorded losses for many years at its German operations but reported a positive operating cash flow for the first time in 2004.

Wild said there were no plans to pull out of Germany altogether. "Germany is the third-largest retail market in the world. As a global company, we cannot afford to ignore it," he said.