Whole Foods Market Inc.’s stock appeared headed for a sixth-straight decline, after it was downgraded Thursday to perform from outperform by analyst Rupesh Parikh at Oppenheimer, who said he no longer expects a new bidder to emerge to compete with Amazon.com Inc.’s buyout bid of $42 a share. The stock had closed as high as $43.26 on June 21, or 3% above Amazon’s bid, but has closed lower every day since then. The stock was down 0.4% at $42.10 in premarket trade Thursday. Parikh was among those that said another bid could materialize, and therefore had raised his stock price target to $45 from $40 when the deal was announced on June 16. On Thursday, he removed his price target. “Although we believe [Amazon’s] bid undervalues the company, it now appears less likely a new bid will come from a strategic player, and it is less likely that private money will attempt to outbid [Amazon],” Parikh wrote in a note to clients. Whole Foods shares have run up 37% year to date, while the S&P 500 has gained 9%.
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