** Apparel and footwear maker VF Corp's VFC.N shares fall 3.8% to $20.43 premarket after J.P. Morgan downgrades stock to 'underweight' from 'neutral'

** Co reported a decline in Vans brand Q3 sales last month

** Brokerage says the brand is struggling with weak store traffic and wholesale demand

** Says brand needs more investment in stores in marketing, limiting its near-term growth

** "Relative to management’s outlook for Vans to decline mid-single-digits Y/Y in 4Q26, we model a similar negative midsingle-digit decline in 1H27" - J.P. Morgan

** JPM also sees moderating revenue growth at Timberland brand and within Europe/APAC at The North Face, extending potential margin recovery timeline

** Cuts PT to $18 from $19, a 15% downside to VFC's last close of $21.23

** 6 of 25 brokerages rate the stock "buy" or higher, 16 "hold" and 3 "sell"; their median PT is $19.5 - LSEG data

** Stock up 17.4% YTD, declined 15.7% in 2025

(Reporting by Utkarsh Tushar Hathi)

((utkarshtushar.hathi@thomsonreuters.com))