Barnes & Noble.com Misses Street, Loses 11.8%

Barnes & Noble.com

(BNBN)

was down 11.8% in preopen

Island

trading.

After Wednesday's close, the online bookseller

posted a fourth-quarter loss of 36 cents per share, missing the lowered

First Call/Thomson Financial

estimate of 31 cents and worse than the year-earlier 27-cent loss.

The company, which was originally supposed to report results last week, said it fired about 16% of its staff, or 350 people.