A Look at Five Declining Stocks and the Developments Behind Their Moves

Whole Foods Market, Inc. (NASDAQ:WFM) is trading around 4% in the red today, extending the losses of the last several days as investors become more and more concerned that the company’s sales are slowing down amid increased competition from larger retailers like Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE:WMT). On the back of these concerns, Cleveland Research has downgraded Whole Foods’ stock to ‘Underperform’ from ‘Neutral’ today, after Oppenheimer and Wedbush each lowered their price targets on the stock last week, to $40.00 and $38.00, respectively. Among the funds from our database, only 36 held stakes in Whole Foods Market, Inc. (NASDAQ:WFM) at the end of June, while in the current round of 13F filings, for the third quarter reporting period, Sanford J. Colen’s Apex Capital reported a new stake in Whole Foods, containing 625,300 shares.

Finally, Chesapeake Energy Corporation (NYSE:CHK)‘s stock has declined by over 5%, a day after Morningstar downgraded its credit rating to ‘B+’ from ‘BB+’ signaling a high level of default risk. The company’s stock has been following the declining trend of oil prices and is down by over 60% year-to-date. Among the funds from our database, the sentiment towards Chesapeake Energy Corporation (NYSE:CHK) is somewhat cautious, since the number of funds with long positions declined by four to 33 during the second quarter, while the aggregate value of their stakes was equal to 23.40% of the company’s market cap at the end of June.

Disclosure: None