Whole Foods plummets after boring earnings

Not even an endless supply of coconut water...  could get Whole Foods ($WFM) stock in good shape right now. Shares of the organic market dropped over 6% in after-hours trading Wednesday as $3.44 billion in quarterly revenue missed analysts' expectations and same-store sales slipped 0.2%.

 

They say all publicity is good publicity...  except Whole Foods didn't get the memo. Over the summer, New York State investigators revealed local Whole Foods locations had been overcharging customers my mis-weighing the farm-to-table foods they stuff into takeout boxes. So that $16 plate of goji berry slaw was probably worth closer to $14.

 

The takeaway...  is that Whole Foods is hungry for Whole Foods stock, and that has investors worried. The chain is taking out a Big Mac-sized loan to repurchase up to $1 billion of its own stock  because it's confident consumers like spending half their paycheck on bags of kale chips -- but Wall Street is concerned the company's just trying to boost the stock price to a healthy level.