StockNews.com Downgrades Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) to Hold

Posted by on Apr 27th, 2023

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM – Get Rating) was downgraded by StockNews.com from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note issued to investors on Thursday.

YUM has been the topic of a number of other research reports. Cowen reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $155.00 price objective on shares of Yum! Brands in a research note on Wednesday, February 8th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft increased their target price on shares of Yum! Brands from $137.00 to $143.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, February 13th. Credit Suisse Group upped their target price on Yum! Brands from $135.00 to $141.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Thursday, February 9th. Wells Fargo & Company assumed coverage on Yum! Brands in a report on Monday, January 23rd. They set an “overweight” rating and a $145.00 price target for the company. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their price target on Yum! Brands from $122.00 to $130.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Wednesday, January 18th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Yum! Brands has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $146.06.

Yum! Brands Stock Performance

Shares of NYSE YUM opened at $138.01 on Thursday. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $130.50 and a 200 day moving average price of $126.70. The firm has a market capitalization of $38.66 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.27, a PEG ratio of 2.22 and a beta of 1.00. Yum! Brands has a 52-week low of $103.96 and a 52-week high of $139.00.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM – Get Rating) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, February 8th. The restaurant operator reported $1.31 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.26 by $0.05. Yum! Brands had a negative return on equity of 15.16% and a net margin of 19.37%. The firm had revenue of $2.04 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.92 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $1.02 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 8.0% compared to the same quarter last year. Analysts forecast that Yum! Brands will post 5.09 earnings per share for the current year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, COO Tracy L. Skeans sold 3,680 shares of Yum! Brands stock in a transaction dated Monday, April 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $136.00, for a total transaction of $500,480.00. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 3,183 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $432,888. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. In other news, CEO David W. Gibbs sold 3,734 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, March 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $128.43, for a total value of $479,557.62. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 57,325 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $7,362,249.75. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. Also, COO Tracy L. Skeans sold 3,680 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, April 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $136.00, for a total transaction of $500,480.00. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 3,183 shares in the company, valued at $432,888. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 23,875 shares of company stock valued at $3,166,805 over the last three months. 0.37% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Large investors have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Norges Bank bought a new stake in Yum! Brands in the fourth quarter valued at $315,239,000. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Yum! Brands by 75,766.0% during the 4th quarter. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC now owns 1,640,982 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $210,177,000 after buying an additional 1,638,819 shares in the last quarter. BlackRock Inc. lifted its stake in shares of Yum! Brands by 6.6% during the 3rd quarter. BlackRock Inc. now owns 20,766,507 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $2,208,310,000 after buying an additional 1,278,710 shares in the last quarter. Two Sigma Investments LP bought a new stake in Yum! Brands during the 4th quarter worth approximately $152,040,000. Finally, Capital World Investors increased its holdings in shares of Yum! Brands by 19.6% in the 1st quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 5,507,237 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $652,773,000 after buying an additional 901,181 shares during the last quarter. 77.54% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

About Yum! Brands

(Get Rating)

Yum! Brands, Inc operates as a service restaurant company. The firm engages in the development, operation, franchise, and licenses of a system of restaurants. It operates through the following segments: KFC Division, Pizza Hut Division, Taco Bell Division, and Habit Burger Grill Division. The KFC Division segment consists of all operations of the KFC concept.

Featured Stories

Analyst Recommendations for Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM)

Receive News & Ratings for Yum! Brands Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for Yum! Brands and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter.