Ron Johnson is not having a good time at trying turn around JCPenney Co. Inc. (NYSE: JCP). Nothing seems to be working here. Now we have Credit Suisse taking an already cautious Neutral rating down to a Sell rating. It gets worse than that as well. Credit Suisse cut the price target for the troubled retailer from $25 to $15.

Michael Exstein of Credit Suisse has thrown in the towel on Ron Johnson. He has voiced mounting concerns that the viability of Johnson’s strategy is questionable, and this is after a report just last week said that the coming holiday season will test the “new” business model at the stores as competitors are responding to its efforts.

Exstein said:

Our concerns that JCP would not be able to stabilize its business in a timely fashion was mounting, especially after seeing how effective the completion had been in responding to JCP’s initiatives. Since reporting a worst case scenario third quarter, those concerns have only escalated, and we downgrade to underperform and lower our target price to $15.”

JCPenney shareholders can expect another drop of about 27% to come, if Credit Suisse’s opinion is correct, based upon the $20.64 closing price. Apparently this voice is being believed, as the stock is down about 3.5% at $19.90, against a 52-week trading range of $19.06 to $43.18.

JON C. OGG

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