First Trust Advisors LP Sells 33,754 Shares of Yum! Brands, Inc. $YUM

First Trust Advisors LP cut its position in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) by 7.5% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The firm owned 418,752 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after selling 33,754 shares during the period. First Trust Advisors LP owned about 0.15% of Yum! Brands worth $65,108,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Norges Bank acquired a new position in Yum! Brands in the fourth quarter valued at about $706,799,000. Capital International Investors increased its stake in Yum! Brands by 20.0% during the 4th quarter. Capital International Investors now owns 19,419,826 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $2,938,139,000 after purchasing an additional 3,240,190 shares in the last quarter. Alyeska Investment Group L.P. acquired a new stake in Yum! Brands during the 4th quarter worth approximately $272,794,000. Invesco Ltd. lifted its stake in Yum! Brands by 42.2% in the fourth quarter. Invesco Ltd. now owns 4,183,964 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $632,950,000 after buying an additional 1,240,777 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Boston Partners acquired a new position in shares of Yum! Brands in the fourth quarter valued at approximately $168,604,000. 82.37% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, CEO Sean Tresvant sold 3,000 shares of Yum! Brands stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, May 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $154.68, for a total value of $464,040.00. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 3,140 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $485,695.20. The trade was a 48.86% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, CEO Aaron Powell sold 6,001 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, July 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $160.42, for a total value of $962,680.42. Following the sale, the chief executive officer owned 12,003 shares in the company, valued at $1,925,521.26. The trade was a 33.33% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders have sold 12,423 shares of company stock valued at $1,953,721 in the last quarter. 0.14% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Yum! Brands Trading Up 1.0%

Shares of YUM opened at $148.82 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $41.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 24.00, a PEG ratio of 1.88 and a beta of 0.56. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a 12 month low of $137.33 and a 12 month high of $170.14. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $154.06 and a 200 day simple moving average of $156.71.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 29th. The restaurant operator reported $1.50 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.39 by $0.11. Yum! Brands had a net margin of 20.48% and a negative return on equity of 23.51%. The firm had revenue of $2.06 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.04 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $1.30 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 15.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, research analysts predict that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 6.74 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Yum! Brands announced that its board has approved a stock repurchase plan on Tuesday, June 16th that authorizes the company to repurchase $4.00 billion in shares. This repurchase authorization authorizes the restaurant operator to reacquire up to 9.4% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase plans are generally an indication that the company’s management believes its stock is undervalued.

Yum! Brands Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, June 12th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, May 27th were issued a $0.75 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, May 27th. This represents a $3.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 2.0%. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 48.39%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts recently commented on YUM shares. Wells Fargo & Company boosted their price objective on shares of Yum! Brands from $160.00 to $165.00 and gave the company an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. TD Cowen restated a “buy” rating and issued a $180.00 price target on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Tuesday, June 16th. Weiss Ratings lowered Yum! Brands from a “buy (b+)” rating to a “buy (b)” rating in a report on Wednesday, May 6th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft set a $177.00 price objective on Yum! Brands in a research report on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, UBS Group reiterated a “buy” rating on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Thursday, June 18th. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and seven have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $174.81.

Yum! Brands Company Profile

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.