According to a report published by J.P. Morgan Chase, the decline in net profit in the first half of the year was mainly due to a 19% increase in operating costs, a weak shopping atmosphere in the market, and the introduction of competition from other consumption models (such as shopping malls). However, the bank believes that the problems facing Parkson are more structural than cyclical; in addition to continuing to be taken over by large department stores, the old-style decoration of its stores, low store ownership, and rising rental costs will also affect performance. In addition, Parkson's same-store sales declined slightly by 0.7% in the first half of the year, mainly due to a quarterly increase of 8 percentage points to 20% in gold and jewellery sales in the second quarter. Excluding this project, same-store sales should fall to 1% in the first half of the year. In terms of opening stores, the Group will open 3 more stores by the end of this year, for a total of 7 stores throughout the year; in the next few years, it will open 5 more stores per year in existing cities. Omo expects that Parkson's same-store sales will not show any outstanding performance in the second half of the year, or increase by only 3%. Daimo believes that although Parkson's operating cost growth in the second half of the year will be lower than in the first half of the year due to the signing of new leases, its gross profit performance will still decline year by year. It is predicted that its overall operating profit will drop 7%, an improvement from the 32% decline in the first half of the year. As for Baisheng's profit and net profit forecasts for the full year of 2013, Damo also lowered 23% and 27% respectively, while the predicted price-earnings ratios for 2013 and 2014 were 12.5 and 11.5 times, respectively, maintaining the “reduced holdings” rating. The 12-month target price fell from 3.6 to 2.7 yuan.