Sears Holdings Corp Vendor Halts Shipments, Can't Get Insurance

Sears Holdings Corp SHLD shares plunged Wednesday on a report that at least one vendor has halted shipments ahead of a holiday season inventory build-up because of an inability to obtain insurance policies that guarantee payment.

The vendor, a privately held company, wasn't identified in the report by Bloomberg, which cited unnamed sources.

A major insurer of payments for retail shipments, Euler Hermes Group, stopped coverage for new Sears shipments recently, according to a report Sunday by Reuters.

Coface SA plans a similar move and Atradius Credit Insurance, another of the insurers, said it's scaling back coverage, according to Bloomberg.

Sears recently borrowed about $400 million from its chairman and CEO Edward S. Lampbert, who also agreed to acquire a $168 million stake in Sears Canada.

Shares of the retailer are down nearly 45 percent year to date. In early trading Wednesday, Sears was off 12 percent at $26.53 per share.