Analysts at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Credit Suisse Group have downgraded Sears Holding Corp. stock and advised investors to sell their shares, Bloomberg reported.

A drop in holiday sales resulted in profits that trailed analysts’ expectations.

Sears Holdings dropped $8.31, or 8.6 percent, to $87.86 in early trading this morning on the Nasdaq Stock Market. The shares fell 39 percent last year.

Sears Holdings has reported declining sales in stores open at least a year in every quarter since investor Edward Lampert combined the Kmart and Sears Roebuck & Co. chains in March 2005. Mid-priced department stores such as J.C. Penney Co. Inc. and Kohl’s Corp. and discounter Target Corp. lured shoppers with exclusive clothing and home brands, and Wal-Mart Stores Inc. pitched one-stop shopping and cut prices.

Like those competitors, Sears also had to contend with consumers besieged by higher food and fuel costs and declining housing values. U.S. retailers’ holiday sales at stores open more than a year gained 2.2 percent, the slowest growth since 2002, the International Council of Shopping Centers said on Jan. 10.

The National Retail Federation predicted today that sales might rise at the slowest pace in six years in 2008.