Brian Cornell effectively signed off to Wall Street on Wednesday.

It felt something like a bittersweet goodbye for Cornell, who after 11 years as Target Corp.’s chief executive officer will pass the torch to Michael Fiddelke in February.

That’s because even though third-quarter results came in about as expected, they were still disappointing for a retailer that not long ago was the cheap-chic leader.

Net earnings in the three-month period fell 19.3 percent to $689 million, which included $120 million in after-tax costs as the company cut 1,800 corporate jobs last month, trying to remove complexity and enable quicker decision-making.

Sales slipped 1.5 percent to $25.3 billion, with a 1.9 percent decline in merchandise sales. Comparable sales in the apparel department were down 5 pe

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