J.C. Penney: No News Is Bad News
courtesy J.C. Penney Co. Inc.When the Black Friday weekend shopping craze ended, J.C. Penney Co. Inc. (NYSE: JCP) did not waste any time announcing that same-store sales for the month of November had jumped 10.1% year-over-year. The company reported the…
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When the Black Friday weekend shopping craze ended, J.C. Penney Co. Inc. (NYSE: JCP) did not waste any time announcing that same-store sales for the month of November had jumped 10.1% year-over-year. The company reported the rise on the Monday after the weekend, well ahead other retailers that reported — as scheduled — on the following Thursday.
The month of December has been in the books since last Thursday and we still have not heard a peep from J.C. Penney about its same-store sales for the month. Given the company’s eagerness to post November’s good news, a logical conclusion is that it would be just as eager to post good news for December.
But what if the news isn’t good? J.C. Penney’s same-store sales fell more than 30% in the fourth quarter of 2012, so the bar was not very high. Research firm Retail Metrics has estimated last month’s same-store sales rose 5.3% at J.C. Penney. That’s not terrific, but it is not awful either, especially given a relatively low overall expectation for same-store sales to rise just 2.6%.
Investors are not losing any time dumping the stock though. Shares are down 4.6% late Tuesday afternoon at $8.26 in a 52-week range of $6.24 to $23.10. Share volume is about 10 million shares below the average daily volume of nearly 35 million.
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Paul Ausick has been writing for 247Wallst.com for more than a decade. He has written extensively on investing in the energy, defense, and technology sectors. In a previous life, he wrote technical documentation and managed a marketing communications group in Silicon Valley.
He has a bachelor's degree in English from the University of Chicago and now lives in Montana, where he fishes for trout in the summer and stays inside during the winter.
