Ballentine Partners LLC Takes $316,000 Position in Wingstop Inc. $WING

Ballentine Partners LLC bought a new stake in Wingstop Inc. (NASDAQ:WING) during the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor bought 938 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock, valued at approximately $316,000.

Several other hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. MassMutual Private Wealth & Trust FSB raised its stake in Wingstop by 93.9% in the first quarter. MassMutual Private Wealth & Trust FSB now owns 128 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $29,000 after buying an additional 62 shares during the period. Signaturefd LLC increased its holdings in shares of Wingstop by 106.9% during the 1st quarter. Signaturefd LLC now owns 149 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $34,000 after acquiring an additional 77 shares during the last quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Wingstop by 121.4% during the 1st quarter. Geneos Wealth Management Inc. now owns 217 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $49,000 after acquiring an additional 119 shares during the last quarter. UMB Bank n.a. raised its stake in Wingstop by 280.3% in the 1st quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 270 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $61,000 after acquiring an additional 199 shares during the period. Finally, Parallel Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in Wingstop by 22.3% during the 2nd quarter. Parallel Advisors LLC now owns 181 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $61,000 after purchasing an additional 33 shares during the last quarter.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts have commented on WING shares. Morgan Stanley upped their price objective on shares of Wingstop from $367.00 to $405.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, July 31st. Citigroup upped their price target on shares of Wingstop from $296.00 to $321.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, July 15th. Piper Sandler assumed coverage on shares of Wingstop in a report on Wednesday, July 9th. They issued an “overweight” rating on the stock. Benchmark boosted their price objective on Wingstop from $325.00 to $410.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, July 31st. Finally, UBS Group increased their target price on Wingstop from $335.00 to $385.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Thursday, July 31st. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, twenty have given a Buy rating and five have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $380.52.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Michael Skipworth sold 4,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $370.34, for a total transaction of $1,666,530.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 42,777 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $15,842,034.18. This represents a 9.52% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Alex Kaleida sold 5,400 shares of Wingstop stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, August 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $376.09, for a total transaction of $2,030,886.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer directly owned 8,362 shares in the company, valued at $3,144,864.58. This trade represents a 39.24% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 21,838 shares of company stock worth $8,118,535 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 0.72% of the company’s stock.

Wingstop Stock Down 0.7%

NASDAQ WING opened at $247.44 on Monday. The firm has a 50-day moving average price of $309.12 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $296.28. Wingstop Inc. has a 12-month low of $204.00 and a 12-month high of $427.00. The company has a market capitalization of $6.91 billion, a P/E ratio of 41.24, a P/E/G ratio of 3.11 and a beta of 1.87.

Wingstop (NASDAQ:WING) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 30th. The restaurant operator reported $1.00 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $0.88 by $0.12. The business had revenue of $174.33 million for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $172.60 million. Wingstop had a negative return on equity of 17.07% and a net margin of 25.61%.The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 12.0% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business posted $0.93 earnings per share. Equities analysts expect that Wingstop Inc. will post 4.18 EPS for the current year.

Wingstop Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, September 5th. Investors of record on Friday, August 15th were given a dividend of $0.30 per share. This is a positive change from Wingstop’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.27. This represents a $1.20 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.5%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, August 15th. Wingstop’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 20.00%.

About Wingstop

Wingstop Inc, together with its subsidiaries, franchises and operates restaurants under the Wingstop brand. Its restaurants offer classic wings, boneless wings, tenders, and hand-sauced-and-tossed in various flavors, as well as chicken sandwiches with fries and hand-cut carrots and celery that are cooked-to-order.