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Marvin Ellison's exit as CEO of J.C. Penney means the struggling department store chain can't be turned around, CNBC's Jim Cramer said Tuesday. Loading... J.C. Penney shares plunged Tuesday after Lowe's announced it is naming Ellison president and CEO, effective July 2. J.C. Penney, which has struggled to compete within the quickly changing retail landscape, told CNBC that it was informed by Ellison a couple days ago of the move. "If there was any chance [of a turnaround], I think you would stay," Cramer said on "Squawk on the Street." "Because it would obviously be such a kick in the...

NEW YORK — J.C. Penney said Friday that it will be closing anywhere from 130 to 140 stores as well as two distribution centers over the next several months as it aims to improve profitability in the era of online shopping. The closures represent about 13 percent to 14 percent of the department store operator's current store count, and less than 5 percent of total annual sales. The company said that it would also initiate a voluntary early retirement program for about 6,000 eligible employees.

The retailer sees a big opportunity in the appliance business, and in Sears' problems. For the first time in 33 years, the department store will be selling home appliances like refrigerators and washing machines by General Electric, Hotpoint, LG and Samsung, at 22 of its roughly 1,000 stores. If all goes well with the pilot, which begins Feb. 1 in stores in the San Antonio, San Diego and Tampa metro areas, Penney could roll out the home appliance offerings to hundreds more stores by October. The return to home appliances is the first major new initiative by former Home Depot...

Get ready for the next era in retail—one that will be characterized by far fewer shops and smaller stores. On Tuesday, Sears said that it will shutter its flagship store in downtown Chicago in April. It's the latest of about 300 store closures in the U.S. that Sears has made since 2010. The news follows announcements earlier this month of multiple store closings from major department stores J.C. Penney and Macy's. Further signs of cuts in the industry came Wednesday, when Target said that it will eliminate 475 jobs worldwide, including some at its Minnesota headquarters, and not fill 700...

Yesterday afternoon, JCPenney announced it would be laying off around 2,500 employees and shuttering 33 underperforming stores around the country. Want to know if your local JCP made the cut?

Citigroup Agrees to Sell Hedge Fund's Shares to New Buyers at $12.90 Each.Hedge-fund manager Bill Ackman moved to dump his entire stake in J.C. Penney Co., ending a failed bet on the retailer that cost his fund more than $600 million, resulted in the loss of thousands of jobs and left the 1,100-store chain still struggling to right itself.

A JCPenney back-to-school ad that implies kids will be friendless unless they wear the right clothing is promoting bullying, charged a flurry of critics on social media this week. “Your ad about cool kids wearing JCPenney clothes, showing a child sitting alone at lunch is despicable,” fired off one Facebook user. Another added, “How clueless are you? What a horrible bully-promoting commercial.” Twitter users have called it “tone deaf” and “more self-immolation” for the company. The ad, posted online by the retailer in late July and aired as part of a TV campaign earlier this summer, includes a shot of...

Shares of embattled retailer J.C. Penney Co. fell another 2.5% in premarket trading on Friday amid an interal battle with shareholders. The board slammed Pershing Square Capital Management's Bill Ackman for a letter in which he criticized the board's failure to find a longer-term solution for the Chief Executive Officer Mike Ulman.

It would appear that in the order of who knows what when, in the case of JCPenney, it is C-level executives first, credit markets second (was Goldman's line a pre-DIP?), and equity shareholders (Ackamn included) last. With the torrent of executve departures in the last year, credit market investors led the equity over the past two weeks as credit lines were (allegedly) pulled. Today's 50bps rise in JCP's 5Y CDS pushes the company's risk of bankruptcy to its highest ever (arguably higher than 65% over the next few years given the secured assets). JCP's stock is down 2% on the...

The apology from J.C. Penney's (NYSE: JCP) in the "We're Listening" campaign seems to be working, at least for now. Customers have been returning to stores in the wake of J.C. Penney re-opening celebrations. During the tenure of a rough year riddled with mistakes and hard-learned lessons, J.C. Penney found that the soul of their customer was driven by super low sale prices and an enthusiasm for home and back to school shopping.

There's one great thing about J.C. Penney's last quarter: It's over. The struggling retailer lost a whopping $289 million for the three months ended on May 4, with sales plunging 16.4% versus a year prior.

J.C. Penney Co. (JCP -3.07%) forecast a sharper-than-expected decline in fiscal first-quarter sales, citing the effect of former Chief Executive Ron Johnson's strategies to turn around the struggling department-store operator. For the quarter ended Saturday, the company said it expects to post sales of roughly $2.64 billion, a 16% drop from the prior year. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expect sales of $2.74 billion, or a 13% decline. Same-store sales were estimated to be down 16.6%, after falling 18.9% a year earlier.

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Legendary investor George Soros‘ Soros Fund Management has taken a 7.9% stake in the retailer, according to an SEC filing Thursday. The news sent J.C. Penney shares higher after-hours, up 6.6% to $16.25. At that price, Soros’ holdings are worth $283 million.Soros, who famously “broke the Bank of England” in 1992 as part of a group that heavily shorted the British pound, owns just under 17.4 million shares of J.C. Penney, according to the filing. His stake puts him among the retailer’s five largest shareholders.

A year and a half into his dismal attempt to turn around J.C. Penney, Ron Johnson was ousted as chief executive on Monday and replaced with his predecessor, Myron E. Ullman III, as the board searched for a new direction for the struggling retailer. The board said Mr. Ullman, who was at the helm for seven years, “is well positioned to quickly analyze the situation J.C. Penney faces and take steps to improve the company’s performance.” Penney’s shares, after initially rising 10 percent after hours on reports that Mr. Johnson was out, then headed downward and were off more than...

J.C. Penney Co. shares jumped 11% in after hours on Monday as CNBC, citing an unidentified source, said Chief Executive Ron Johnson is no longer head of the company.

J.C. Penney Co Inc said on Friday said it fully backs its partnership with chat show host Ellen DeGeneres after a conservative group urged the retailer to reconsider hiring DeGeneres as a spokeswoman because she is a lesbian. -snip- Penney's decision to hire DeGeneres spurred conservative group One Million Moms, a division of the American Family Association, to slam the company for not being "neutral in the culture war." "Funny that JC Penney thinks hiring an open homosexual spokesperson will help their business when most of their customers are traditional families. More sales will be lost than gained unless they...

J.C. Penney Co Inc Chief Executive Ron Johnson received total compensation of $1.9 million in 2012, according to a regulatory filing on Tuesday, a sharp decline after a year that saw the department store chain's sales fall perilously. [Snip] Johnson's base salary was unchanged at $1.5 million, but he received no bonus or stock award in 2012 because of Penney's results, Penney said in its filing. He was eligible in 2012 for a bonus of $1.875 million.

J.C. Penney Co. (JCP) Chief Executive Ron Johnson saw the value of his compensation plunge 96% last year, as he received little more than his straight salary after getting rich stock awards when he joined the retailer in 2011. The executive's performance has been under intense scrutiny lately, as his vision for reviving the department-store chain--by filling it with boutiques and forsaking perpetual clearances--has failed to stem sliding sales. Members of J.C. Penney's board would consider ousting Mr. Johnson or selling the company if sales declines don't reverse, The Wall Street Journal reported last month.

JCPenney CEO Ron Johnson has quietly begun to hike prices across the company’s stores, The Post has learned. It’s a humiliating about-face as the former Apple exec scrambles to restore the traditional sales events he ditched last year. The increases are significant, as prices return broadly to previous levels before Johnson slashed them in his “fair and square” initiative. The push permanently lowered prices while eliminating sales events and coupons in February 2012, sources said. A pair of Nike swimming trunks priced at $25, for example, has been raised to $45, according to data reviewed by The Post. A bikini...