Northern Trust Corp Lowers Position in Denny’s Co. (NASDAQ:DENN)

Northern Trust Corp lessened its stake in Denny’s Co. (NASDAQ:DENN) by 2.5% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 484,481 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after selling 12,624 shares during the period. Northern Trust Corp owned about 0.94% of Denny’s worth $2,931,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Quarry LP boosted its position in Denny’s by 178.4% in the 4th quarter. Quarry LP now owns 9,618 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $58,000 after purchasing an additional 6,163 shares in the last quarter. Marshall Wace LLP purchased a new position in shares of Denny’s during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $61,000. RPO LLC purchased a new position in shares of Denny’s during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $63,000. Boothbay Fund Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Denny’s during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $120,000. Finally, Two Sigma Securities LLC purchased a new position in shares of Denny’s during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $121,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 85.07% of the company’s stock.

Insider Activity at Denny’s

In related news, EVP Stephen C. Dunn bought 9,815 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 26th. The stock was acquired at an average cost of $5.08 per share, with a total value of $49,860.20. Following the purchase, the executive vice president now directly owns 113,666 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $577,423.28. The trade was a 9.45% increase in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. 4.20% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on DENN. Oppenheimer decreased their target price on Denny’s from $7.00 to $6.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, May 6th. Piper Sandler decreased their target price on Denny’s from $7.00 to $6.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, February 18th. Citigroup decreased their target price on Denny’s from $7.00 to $6.25 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, April 24th. Finally, Wedbush decreased their target price on Denny’s from $10.00 to $8.50 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, February 13th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $7.46.

Denny’s Stock Performance

NASDAQ DENN opened at $3.81 on Friday. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $3.69 and a 200 day moving average price of $5.11. Denny’s Co. has a one year low of $2.85 and a one year high of $7.73. The company has a market cap of $195.27 million, a P/E ratio of 9.29 and a beta of 1.63.

Denny’s (NASDAQ:DENN) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Monday, May 5th. The restaurant operator reported $0.08 EPS for the quarter, meeting the consensus estimate of $0.08. Denny’s had a negative return on equity of 50.01% and a net margin of 4.77%. The firm had revenue of $111.64 million during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $110.11 million. During the same period in the prior year, the company earned $0.11 EPS. The firm’s revenue was up 1.5% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Denny’s Co. will post 0.5 EPS for the current fiscal year.

About Denny’s

Denny’s Corp. engages in the operation of restaurants and franchised, and licensed restaurants. It operates through the Denny’s and Other segments. The Denny’s segment includes the results of all company and franchised and licensed Denny’s restaurants. The Other segment refers to the results of all company and franchise restaurants.