The WSJ has reported that Carl Icahn has been amassing a stake in J.C.Penney Co. (NYSE: JCP). Unfortunately, the WSJ is citing "people familiar with the matter." Those people are not always clear and not always perfect, although we’d be under the opinion that the WSJ wouldn’t have run this based solely on "people" if it hadn’t gotten confirmation from unrelated sources that may know.
We don’t know the size of the stake taken if this really occurred, although one noted that the holding may be on of the larger holdings. As J.C.Penney has a $10+ Billion market cap, there is a lot of stock that could be acquired.
We’ll probably get to find out if this is real or if this isn’t tonight, because Carl Icahn is scheduled to appear briefly on CNBC’s FAST MONEY at 5:00 PM EST.
So far J.C.Penney shares are up a bit over 1% at $48.00, although the stock has traded as high as $49.14 today. The 52-week trading range is $33.27 to $87.18. While many retail stocks were punished hard, JCP shares are actually up so far in 2008.
CEO Ullman is one of Jim Cramer’s favorite CEO’s as well so we’d expect Cramer to be discussing this tonight on CNBC’s MAD MONEY as this is a retail stock and within his current trends.
Jon C. Ogg
February 1, 2008
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