UPDATE: Bank of America Downgrades Family Dollar Stores; Lowers PO

According to a research report published Thursday, Bank of America has downgraded Family Dollar Stores

from Neutral to Underperform, and lowered the PO from $71 to $60. In the report, Bank of America said, "We are lowering our rating on FDO from Neutral to Underperform and cutting EPS and our PO to $60 (15x our FY13E P/E) from $71 on concerns that margins and earnings will disappoint. Given the performance that the stock has had (+22% in the last 4M), expectations are very high…but execution risk is even higher, in our view. While we remain very positive on the dollar store subsector, we continue to prefer Dollar General, which we believe will be the long-term beneficiary in retail." Family Dollar Stores closed Wednesday at $69.91.