For Immediate Release

Chicago, IL – November 16, 2009 – Zacks.com announces the list of stocks featured in the Analyst Blog. Every day the Zacks Equity Research analysts discuss the latest news and events impacting stocks and the financial markets. Stocks recently featured in the blog include: JC Penney Company Inc. (JCP), Toyota (TM), Honda (HMC), EnCana (ECA) and Chesapeake (CHK).

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Here are highlights from Friday’s Analyst Blog:

JC Penney Beats on Low Earnings

JC Penney Company Inc. (JCP), a leading retailer of apparel and footwear, accessories, fashion jewelry, beauty products and home furnishings, recently reported third-quarter 2009 results.

The quarterly earnings of 11 cents a share tumbled 80% from 55 cents posted in the prior-year quarter,

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JC Penney Company Inc. (JCP), a leading retailer of apparel and footwear, accessories, fashion jewelry, beauty products and home furnishings, recently reported third-quarter 2009 results. The quarterly earnings of 11 cents a share tumbled 80% from 55 cents posted in the prior-year quarter, weighed down by qualified pension plan expense. Earnings missed the Zacks Consensus Estimate by a penny. The retailer, however, mentioned that earnings outshined the company’s initial guidance range of a loss of 5 cents to profit of 5 cents a share on the heels of effective inventory management and lowered unprofitable discounting. Consequently, gross profit rose 1.9% year-on-year to $1,696 million. On stronger-than-expected results, JC Penney raised its fiscal year 2009 earnings outlook. Management now expects earnings in the range of 93 cents to $1.08 per share, as against 75 cents to 90 cents previously anticipated. For the fourth-quarter 2009, earnings are ...

Avon Products Inc. (AVP) is seeing bullish earnings estimates ahead of reporting next week. The full-year Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.66 per share is up 5 cents over the past 90 days. For 2010, analysts polled by Zacks are projecting earnings of $2.11 per share, versus last month's $2.08 and the 3 months-ago forecast of $1.95.

Company Description

Avon Products is beauty company with over $10 billion in annual revenue. As the world's largest direct seller, Avon markets to women in more than 100 countries through 5.8 million independent Avon Sales Representatives. Avon's product line includes beauty products as well as fashion and home products. The company features such well-recognized brand names as Avon Color, Anew, Skin-So-Soft, Advance Techniques, Avon Naturals and Mark.

Rising Forecasts and Strong Momentum

The company is seeing bullish earnings estimates ahead of reporting nest week. The full-year Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.66 per share is up 5 cents

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J. C. Penney Company Inc. (JCP) a leading retailer of apparel and footwear, accessories, fashion jewelry, beauty products and home furnishings – announced that it expects comparable-store sales for the month of September 2009 to dip in the range of 3% to 6% compared to a 12.4% decline reported for September 2008. The company’s comparable-store sales for the month of August dipped 7.9% compared to a 4.9% decline reported in the same month last year. Comps were well within the company’s guidance range of a 6% to 9% decline predicted earlier. Year-to-date, comps slid 8.4% compared to a fall of 5.7% posted in the same period last year.
 By category, home furnishings were the weakest during the month of August. Driving sales were the women’s and children's apparel divisions. Sales for August declined 5.6% to $1,428 million from $1,513 million reported in the same month ...

By now we’ve all heard of Amazon’s near-billion dollar acquisition of Zappos which provided a tremendous return to Zappos’ original investors – Sequoia Capital and Venture Frogs. In fact, they only invested $60 million in the company over seven rounds. And, now, they’re sitting on a billion dollar return. How’s that for IRR?

Obviously, this is the magic of venture capital and outside of investing in a publicly traded venture BDC like Harris and Harris (Ticker: TINY), there’s not much we at home investors can do to get in on the ground floor. But, with up and coming retailers, we can still win! Heck, everyone remembers when Zappos was a low-price retailer instead of just a “customer service focused” retailer. Those were good days weren’t they?

Well, it seems a new trend is hitting the web. “Private” members-only luxury sample sale sites.  These retailers focus on getting limited quantities of

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J. C. Penney Company Inc. (JCP) a leading retailer of apparel and footwear, accessories, fashion jewelry, beauty products and home furnishings – recently reported sales results for the four-week period ended August 29, 2009. The company’s comparable-store sales for the month of August dipped 7.9% compared to a 4.9% decline reported in the same month last year. Comps were well within the company’s guidance range of a 6% to 9% decline predicted earlier. Year-to-date, comps slid 8.4% compared to a fall of 5.7% posted in the same period last year. J. C. Penney expects comparable store sales to dip in the range of 3% to 6% for the month of September 2009 compared to a 12.4% decline reported for September 2008. By categories, home furnishings were the weakest during the month. Driving sales were the women’s and children's apparel divisions. Sales for August declined ...

J. C. Penney Company, Inc. (JCP) has reported better-than-expected second quarter results with the successful execution of its Bridge Plan strategy and improvement in the merchandise flow processes. The Bridge Plan strategy involves significant cost-cutting moves, including reduction of new store openings and remodeling operations, pruning of inventory in alignment with sales, and prudent capital expenditure plans. The company reported break-even earnings during the quarter compared to 52 cents per share in the year-earlier quarter. The year-over-year decrease in net income was due to 28 cents per share in after-tax charges related to a qualified pension plan expense of $73 million during the quarter. Total sales during the quarter decreased 7.9% while comparable store sales decreased 9.5%. The year-over-year decline in sales was primarily due to the continued economic downturn plaguing the industry that has resulted in reduced consumer discretionary income and a cut in ...

Green Planet Bioengineering Co. Ltd. operates through its Chinese subsidiary to serve as a high-tech bioengineering enterprise. The company researches, develops, produces and markets extracts from tobacco leaves residue for use in health and beauty products.

As of yesterday, the Miami-based company is a publicly traded company on the Over the Counter Bulletin Board, reflecting the company’s ambition to move forward with its business strategy and take advantage of the U.S. marketplace.

“We are very excited to start our entry into the U.S. public market. We have embarked in a dynamic journey and are now well positioned to take Green Planet to the next level in its development,” chairman and CEO of Green Planet Min Zhao stated in the press release. “We are focused on the execution of our business plan which calls for organic as well as acquisition driven growth.”

The company also focuses its R&D efforts to create

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Makeup.com is as the name implies: an online provider of “exclusive, hard-to-find” cosmetics, perfumes, skin care and other beauty products. The company today announced its year-end financial results for the 12 months ended December 31, 2008, reflecting solid growth and improvement.

Revenues for the year increased $176,998, or 35 percent, to $683,185, as compared to $506,187 for the 2007. Gross profit surged 116 percent to $242,968, up from $112,374 reported for the year ended December 2007. Net loss for the year ended 2008 was $1,195,894, as compared to a net loss of $1,470,145 for fiscal 2007, representing a $274,251 improvement.

“We are very pleased to report another year of strong growth and improved financial results. Although 2008 had many economic challenges, we were able to increase revenue, improve profit margins and lower expenses.” Robert Rook, CEO and president of makeup.com stated in the press releases.

Rook accredits the gains to

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Hong Kong-based health and beauty products retail chain Mannings has made a low-key entry into the Beijing market. Currently, the brand, which is one of the two major players in Hong Kong (Watsons is the other) has four outlets in the Chinese capital. These are located in Joy City, Gemdale Plaza, Jusco, and Beijing South railway [...]