DNB Asset Management AS Lowers Position in Yum! Brands, Inc. $YUM

DNB Asset Management AS lowered its stake in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) by 87.7% during the third quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 52,995 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after selling 378,657 shares during the quarter. DNB Asset Management AS’s holdings in Yum! Brands were worth $8,055,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other hedge funds also recently bought and sold shares of YUM. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of Yum! Brands in the 2nd quarter valued at approximately $602,551,000. Invesco Ltd. increased its holdings in Yum! Brands by 34.3% in the 2nd quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 2,789,728 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $413,382,000 after purchasing an additional 713,167 shares during the last quarter. Amundi raised its position in Yum! Brands by 115.8% in the second quarter. Amundi now owns 1,311,849 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $197,013,000 after purchasing an additional 703,891 shares during the period. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Yum! Brands by 2.0% in the third quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 35,242,558 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $5,356,869,000 after purchasing an additional 684,946 shares during the period. Finally, Magellan Asset Management Ltd lifted its stake in Yum! Brands by 35.9% during the second quarter. Magellan Asset Management Ltd now owns 2,306,932 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $341,841,000 after purchasing an additional 609,223 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors 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 that occurred on Thursday, February 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $166.02, for a total value of $40,176.84. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer owned 65,297 shares in the company, valued at approximately $10,840,607.94. The trade was a 0.37% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. 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 value of $47,149.68. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders sold a total of 14,138 shares of company stock valued at $2,289,990 in the last three months. 0.33% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several research firms recently issued reports on YUM. Evercore reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $190.00 price objective on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Friday, February 13th. Citigroup lifted their target price on Yum! Brands from $170.00 to $171.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 5th. Morgan Stanley increased their price target on shares of Yum! Brands from $165.00 to $176.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Tuesday, January 20th. Wells Fargo & Company reissued a “positive” rating on shares of Yum! Brands in a research note on Thursday, February 5th. Finally, The Goldman Sachs Group reaffirmed a “buy” rating and set a $177.00 target price on shares of Yum! Brands in a research note on Wednesday, November 5th. Thirteen equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have assigned a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $174.50.

Yum! Brands Trading Up 1.4%

Shares of NYSE:YUM opened at $168.01 on Monday. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $157.38 and a 200-day simple moving average of $151.13. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a twelve month low of $137.33 and a twelve month high of $169.39. The company has a market capitalization of $46.44 billion, a PE ratio of 30.27, a P/E/G ratio of 2.37 and a beta of 0.64.

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

Yum! Brands Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 6th. Stockholders of record on Friday, February 20th will be issued a $0.75 dividend. This represents a $3.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.8%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 20th. This is an increase from Yum! Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.71. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 54.05%.

About Yum! Brands

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.