MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Best Buy, the nation’s largest specialty electronics retailer, said Thursday that it planned to close 50 of its big-box stores, cut 400 corporate jobs and trim $800 million in costs.


The company, which has about 1,400 locations in the United States, also plans to open 100 smaller and more profitable Best Buy Mobile stores.


“How do we position the company so we’re where our customers need us to be?” Brian Dunn, Best Buy’s chief executive, asked on a conference call with analysts on Thursday. “We’re clearly going to have more doors and less square footage.”


Best Buy is trying to avoid the fate of its former rival, Circuit City, which liquidated in 2009 after it struggled with the changing electronics landscape.


But even as Best Buy announced its changes on Thursday, the Minneapolis-based company posted a $1.7 billion fiscal fourth-quarter loss. Despite the loss, Best Buy’s adjusted results for the quarter topped Wall Street’s expectations. As investors worried that Best Buy’s restructuring didn’t go far enough, its shares slid nearly 7 percent, to close at $24.77.


Best Buy’s loss amounted to $4.89 a share for the period ended March 3, in contrast to a profit of $651 million, or $1.62 a share, a year earlier. The latest financial results included $2.6 billion in charges mostly related to its purchase of the Carphone Warehouse Group’s interest in the Best Buy Mobile profit-sharing agreement and related costs, as well as an impairment charge tied to writing off Best Buy Europe good will and reorganization charges.


Taking these items out, adjusted earnings were $2.47 a share, above the $2.15 a share that analysts surveyed by FactSet forecast. Revenue rose 3 percent, to $16.6 billion, but missed Wall Street’s $17.18 billion estimate.