Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) Shares Sold by Capital Investment Advisors LLC

Capital Investment Advisors LLC lowered its stake in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM – Get Rating) by 10.8% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 6,655 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after selling 803 shares during the period. Capital Investment Advisors LLC’s holdings in Yum! Brands were worth $852,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Sugarloaf Wealth Management LLC grew its holdings in Yum! Brands by 396.6% during the third quarter. Sugarloaf Wealth Management LLC now owns 288 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $31,000 after acquiring an additional 230 shares during the period. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC grew its holdings in Yum! Brands by 668.4% during the third quarter. Exchange Traded Concepts LLC now owns 292 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $31,000 after acquiring an additional 254 shares during the period. TD Capital Management LLC acquired a new position in Yum! Brands during the third quarter worth $54,000. Guardian Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new position in Yum! Brands during the third quarter worth $55,000. Finally, Archer Investment Corp grew its holdings in Yum! Brands by 22.3% during the third quarter. Archer Investment Corp now owns 581 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $62,000 after acquiring an additional 106 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 77.54% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of brokerages recently weighed in on YUM. Cowen reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $155.00 price objective on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Wednesday, February 8th. Argus upgraded Yum! Brands from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $142.00 target price on the stock in a research report on Wednesday, November 23rd. Citigroup boosted their target price on Yum! Brands from $168.00 to $170.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 9th. BMO Capital Markets boosted their target price on Yum! Brands from $137.00 to $140.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 9th. Finally, StockNews.com began coverage on Yum! Brands in a research report on Thursday. They set a “hold” rating on the stock. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and ten have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $145.81.

Yum! Brands Trading Down 0.9 %

Yum! Brands stock opened at $126.85 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $35.53 billion, a P/E ratio of 27.82, a PEG ratio of 2.20 and a beta of 0.98. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $128.79 and a 200 day moving average price of $122.79. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a 52 week low of $103.96 and a 52 week high of $133.77.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM – Get Rating) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, February 8th. The restaurant operator reported $1.31 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.26 by $0.05. The firm had revenue of $2.04 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.92 billion. Yum! Brands had a negative return on equity of 15.16% and a net margin of 19.37%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 8.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $1.02 earnings per share. As a group, equities analysts predict that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 5.1 EPS for the current year.

Yum! Brands Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 10th. Investors of record on Wednesday, February 22nd were paid a $0.605 dividend. This is a positive change from Yum! Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.57. This represents a $2.42 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.91%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, February 21st. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio is presently 53.07%.

Insider Activity at Yum! Brands

In related news, COO Tracy L. Skeans sold 3,925 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $130.00, for a total value of $510,250.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 14,393 shares in the company, valued at $1,871,090. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. In other Yum! Brands news, COO Tracy L. Skeans sold 3,925 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 7th. The stock was sold at an average price of $130.00, for a total transaction of $510,250.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 14,393 shares in the company, valued at $1,871,090. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CEO David W. Gibbs sold 4,259 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $128.52, for a total value of $547,366.68. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 31,715 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $4,076,011.80. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders own 0.37% of the company’s stock.

About Yum! Brands

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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.