CHICAGO (Reuters) - J.C. Penney Co Inc said on Thursday its February sales at department stores open at least a year fell 6.7 percent, and it forecast another decline in March.
Analysts, on average, were expecting February same-store sales to fall 1.9 percent, according to Reuters Estimates.
J.C. Penney shares dropped almost 5 percent in premarket trading to $46.00.
The Plano, Texas-based company said total sales declined 4.4 percent to $1.26 billion in the four weeks ended March 1.
The company had forecast total sales would be about flat and same-department store sales would decrease by a low-single-digit percentage.
Home products continued to show the worst sales, J.C. Penney said in a statement.
The company forecast a low-single-digit decline in same-store sales for the five-week March reporting period, which ends April 5. Total sales for March are expected to be about flat, the company said.
(Reporting by Brad Dorfman, editing by Gerald E. McCormick and John Wallace)
