JPMorgan Chase & Co. Trims Stake in Yum! Brands, Inc. $YUM

JPMorgan Chase & Co. lessened its stake in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) by 15.4% during the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 15,929,995 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after selling 2,889,102 shares during the period. JPMorgan Chase & Co. owned about 5.74% of Yum! Brands worth $2,421,369,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. Norges Bank acquired a new position in shares of Yum! Brands in the 2nd quarter valued at $602,551,000. Invesco Ltd. increased its holdings in Yum! Brands by 34.3% in the second quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 2,789,728 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $413,382,000 after buying an additional 713,167 shares in the last quarter. Amundi raised its position in shares of Yum! Brands by 115.8% in the second quarter. Amundi now owns 1,311,849 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $197,013,000 after acquiring an additional 703,891 shares during the period. Magellan Asset Management Ltd raised its position in shares of Yum! Brands by 35.9% in the second quarter. Magellan Asset Management Ltd now owns 2,306,932 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $341,841,000 after acquiring an additional 609,223 shares during the period. Finally, Compass Wealth Management LLC grew its position in shares of Yum! Brands by 31,860.2% during the 3rd quarter. Compass Wealth Management LLC now owns 450,000 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $68,400,000 after acquiring an additional 448,592 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.37% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

YUM has been the subject of a number of analyst reports. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Monday, December 29th. BMO Capital Markets restated a “market perform” rating and issued a $165.00 price objective on shares of Yum! Brands in a research report on Thursday, February 5th. Morgan Stanley upped their target price on Yum! Brands from $165.00 to $176.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 20th. Sanford C. Bernstein reissued an “overweight” rating and issued a $179.00 price target on shares of Yum! Brands in a research note on Wednesday, January 7th. Finally, Barclays set a $185.00 price target on shares of Yum! Brands and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, February 5th. Fourteen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and nine have given a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $174.29.

Insider Activity at Yum! Brands

In other Yum! Brands news, CEO Aaron Powell sold 12,000 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $161.44, for a total transaction of $1,937,280.00. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 14,650 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,365,096. The trade was a 45.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CEO Scott Mezvinsky sold 276 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $153.17, for a total value of $42,274.92. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. 0.33% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Yum! Brands Stock Down 1.8%

Shares of YUM opened at $160.38 on Monday. The firm’s fifty day moving average is $154.43 and its two-hundred day moving average is $149.63. The stock has a market cap of $44.53 billion, a PE ratio of 28.90, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.26 and a beta of 0.66. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a 52-week low of $137.33 and a 52-week high of $165.32.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, February 4th. The restaurant operator reported $1.73 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.76 by ($0.03). Yum! Brands had a negative return on equity of 22.42% and a net margin of 18.98%.The business had revenue of $2.51 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $2.45 billion. During the same period in the prior year, the business posted $1.61 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 6.4% on a year-over-year basis. As a group, research analysts anticipate that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 5.94 earnings per share for the current year.

Yum! Brands Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 6th. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 20th will be given a $0.75 dividend. This represents a $3.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.9%. This is a boost from Yum! Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.71. The ex-dividend date is Friday, February 20th. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 51.17%.

Yum! Brands Company Profile

Yum! Brands, Inc (NYSE: YUM) is a global quick-service restaurant company that develops, operates and franchises a portfolio of well-known restaurant brands. The company’s principal brands are KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell, each focused on distinct product categories—KFC on fried chicken and related menu items, Pizza Hut on pizza and complementary offerings, and Taco Bell on Mexican-inspired quick-service food. Yum! is headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky and was formed as Tricon Global Restaurants in 1997 when PepsiCo spun off its restaurant businesses, later adopting the Yum! Brands name.

The company’s operating model centers on brand development, system growth and franchising; a large portion of its restaurants are operated by independent franchisees, and Yum! generates revenue through franchise royalties and fees in addition to sales from company-operated locations.