Grantham Mayo Van Otterloo & Co. LLC Takes Position in Yum! Brands, Inc. $YUM

Grantham Mayo Van Otterloo & Co. LLC purchased a new stake in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The fund purchased 4,429 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock, valued at approximately $673,000.

Other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Brighton Jones LLC grew its holdings in Yum! Brands by 8.0% in the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 7,861 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $1,055,000 after purchasing an additional 583 shares during the period. Prospera Financial Services Inc raised its stake in shares of Yum! Brands by 3.2% during the 2nd quarter. Prospera Financial Services Inc now owns 7,195 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $1,067,000 after buying an additional 223 shares during the period. Midwest Trust Co purchased a new position in shares of Yum! Brands during the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $697,000. ProShare Advisors LLC lifted its position in shares of Yum! Brands by 12.4% during the 2nd quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 47,475 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $7,035,000 after buying an additional 5,225 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Allworth Financial LP grew its stake in Yum! Brands by 36.6% in the 2nd quarter. Allworth Financial LP now owns 14,107 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $2,090,000 after acquiring an additional 3,778 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.37% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Yum! Brands

In other Yum! Brands news, CEO Christopher Lee Turner sold 242 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $166.02, for a total value of $40,176.84. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer directly owned 65,297 shares in the company, valued at $10,840,607.94. The trade was a 0.37% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Scott Mezvinsky sold 284 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $166.02, for a total transaction of $47,149.68. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 14,138 shares of company stock valued at $2,289,990. 0.33% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several brokerages recently commented on YUM. Stifel Nicolaus set a $160.00 price target on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Monday, November 17th. UBS Group reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $180.00 target price on shares of Yum! Brands in a research report on Monday, February 2nd. Citigroup boosted their target price on shares of Yum! Brands from $170.00 to $171.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, February 5th. Piper Sandler restated a “neutral” rating on shares of Yum! Brands in a research report on Friday, December 5th. Finally, Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Yum! Brands in a research note on Monday, December 29th. Thirteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Yum! Brands presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $174.50.

More Yum! Brands News

Here are the key news stories impacting Yum! Brands this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Pizza Hut rolled out “Hut Crust,” a marketing and menu push (new Hand‑Tossed recipe + $10 large three‑topping offer) aimed at driving traffic and mix improvement — a consumer-facing initiative that can help sales and franchisee cash flow. PIZZA HUT LAUNCHES HUT CRUST PLATFORM FOR CRUST LOVERS & SETS OUT TO HIRE FIRST-OF-ITS-KIND HUT CRUST CONNOISSEUR
• Positive Sentiment: Yum!’s reported Q4 strength (revenue and comp-sales beats, operating profit up, and ~4,500 net new restaurant openings across KFC/Taco Bell/Pizza Hut) reinforces its scalable, franchise‑led growth story and supports medium‑term earnings upside. Did Yum!’s Q4 Beat and 4,500 New Openings Just Shift Yum! Brands’ (YUM) Investment Narrative?
• Neutral Sentiment: Sector & earnings roundups put Yum! in context with peers — useful framing for investors but not an immediate catalyst. Q4 Earnings Roundup: Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) And The Rest Of The Traditional Fast Food Segment
• Neutral Sentiment: Franchisee-level activity in key markets (Collins Foods acquiring KFC outlets in Germany; Devyani consolidating subsidiaries in India) signals brand expansion via partners — positive for global footprint but has limited immediate impact on YUM’s corporate earnings. Collins Foods to acquire eight KFC outlets in Germany Devyani International to merge three subsidiaries with parent company
• Negative Sentiment: Coverage highlighting Yum!’s underperformance vs. the Dow and relative weakness over the past year is pressuring sentiment — analysts remain moderately upbeat, but valuation (P/E ~28) and comparisons to faster-growing peers leave limited room for error, contributing to today’s pullback. Is Yum! Brands Stock Underperforming the Dow? Is Yum! Brands Stock Underperforming the Dow? (Yahoo)

Yum! Brands Stock Performance

NYSE:YUM opened at $156.56 on Thursday. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a one year low of $137.33 and a one year high of $169.39. The stock has a market cap of $43.28 billion, a PE ratio of 28.21, a P/E/G ratio of 2.24 and a beta of 0.64. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $158.35 and a 200 day moving average price of $151.71.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 4th. The restaurant operator reported $1.73 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.76 by ($0.03). The company had revenue of $2.52 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.45 billion. Yum! Brands had a negative return on equity of 22.42% and a net margin of 18.98%.The business’s quarterly revenue was up 6.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.61 EPS. As a group, analysts predict that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 5.94 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Yum! Brands Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 6th. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 20th were given a dividend of $0.75 per share. This represents a $3.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.9%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, February 20th. This is a positive change from Yum! Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.71. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio is presently 54.05%.

Yum! Brands 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.