Darden Restaurants (DRI) Stock Price, News & Analysis

Company Overview

Darden Restaurants, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, owns and operates full-service restaurants in the United States and Canada. It operates under Olive Garden, LongHorn Steakhouse, Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen, Yard House, The Capital Grille, Seasons 52, Bahama Breeze, Eddie V's Prime Seafood, and Capital Burger brand names. Darden Restaurants, Inc. was incorporated in 1995 and is based in Orlando, Florida.

Key Stats

• Today's Range: $204.19 to $207.01
• 50-Day Range: $203.33 to $226.09
• 52-Week Range: $139.12 to $228.27
• Volume: 482,619 shs
• Average Volume: 1.36 million shs
• Market Capitalization: $24.01 billion
• P/E Ratio: 23.11
• Dividend Yield: 2.92%
• Price Target: $225.19
• Consensus Rating: Moderate Buy

Darden Restaurants Stock Analysis - MarketRank™

Darden Restaurants scored higher than 95% of companies evaluated by MarketBeat, and ranked 16th out of 205 stocks in the retail/wholesale sector. Scores are calculated by averaging available category scores, with extra weight given to analysis and valuation.

Analyst's Opinion

• Score: 2.3 / 5
• Analyst Rating: Moderate Buy

Consensus Rating

Darden Restaurants has received a consensus rating of Moderate Buy. The company's average rating score is 2.59, and is based on 16 buy ratings, 11 hold ratings, and no sell ratings.

Amount of Analyst Coverage

Darden Restaurants has been the subject of 19 research reports in the past 90 days, demonstrating strong analyst interest in this stock.

Earnings and Valuation

• Score: 2.5 / 5
• Proj. Earnings Growth: 11.76%

Earnings Growth

Earnings for Darden Restaurants are expected to grow by 11.76% in the coming year, from $9.52 to $10.64 per share.

Price to Earnings Ratio vs. the Market

The P/E ratio of Darden Restaurants is 23.22, which means that it is trading at a less expensive P/E ratio than the market average P/E ratio of about 26.71.

Price to Earnings Ratio vs. Sector

The P/E ratio of Darden Restaurants is 23.22, which means that it is trading at a less expensive P/E ratio than the Retail/Wholesale sector average P/E ratio of about 31.07.

Price to Earnings Growth Ratio

Darden Restaurants has a PEG Ratio of 1.93. PEG Ratios above 1 indicate that a company could be overvalued.

Price to Book Value per Share Ratio

Darden Restaurants has a P/B Ratio of 10.43. P/B Ratios above 3 indicate that a company could be overvalued with respect to its assets and liabilities.

Short Interest

• Score: 4.0 / 5
• Short Interest Level: Healthy

Percentage of Shares Shorted

3.85% of the float of Darden Restaurants has been sold short.

Short Interest Ratio / Days to Cover

Darden Restaurants has a short interest ratio ("days to cover") of 3, which is generally considered an acceptable ratio of short interest to trading volume.

Change versus previous month

Short interest in Darden Restaurants has recently decreased by 0.44%, indicating that investor sentiment is improving.

Dividend

• Score: 2.5 / 5
• Dividend Strength: Moderate

Dividend Yield

Darden Restaurants pays a meaningful dividend of 2.87%, higher than the bottom 25% of all stocks that pay dividends.

Dividend Growth

Darden Restaurants has only been increasing its dividend for 4 years.

Dividend Coverage

The dividend payout ratio of Darden Restaurants is 67.57%. This payout ratio is at a healthy, sustainable level, below 75%.

Dividend Sustainability

Based on earnings estimates, Darden Restaurants will have a dividend payout ratio of 56.39% next year. This indicates that Darden Restaurants will be able to sustain or increase its dividend.

Sustainability and ESG

• Score: 3.1 / 5
• Environmental Score: -3.04

Percentage of Shares Shorted

3.85% of the float of Darden Restaurants has been sold short.

Short Interest Ratio / Days to Cover

Darden Restaurants has a short interest ratio ("days to cover") of 3, which is generally considered an acceptable ratio of short interest to trading volume.

Change versus previous month

Short interest in Darden Restaurants has recently decreased by 0.44%, indicating that investor sentiment is improving.

News and Social Media

• Score: 2.9 / 5
• News Sentiment: 1.27

News Sentiment

Darden Restaurants has a news sentiment score of 1.27. This score is calculated as an average of sentiment of articles about the company over the last seven days and ranges from 2 (good news) to -2 (bad news). This is a higher news sentiment than the 0.76 average news sentiment score of Retail/Wholesale companies.

News Coverage This Week

MarketBeat has tracked 23 news articles for Darden Restaurants this week, compared to 19 articles on an average week.

Search Interest

Only 6 people have searched for DRI on MarketBeat in the last 30 days. This is a decrease of -74% compared to the previous 30 days.

MarketBeat Follows

Only 8 people have added Darden Restaurants to their MarketBeat watchlist in the last 30 days. This is a decrease of -11% compared to the previous 30 days.

Company Ownership

• Score: 2.5 / 5
• Insider Trading: Selling Shares

Insider Buying vs. Insider Selling

In the past three months, Darden Restaurants insiders have sold more of their company's stock than they have bought. Specifically, they have bought $0.00 in company stock and sold $9,609,494.00 in company stock.

Percentage Held by Insiders

Only 0.58% of the stock of Darden Restaurants is held by insiders.

Percentage Held by Institutions

93.64% of the stock of Darden Restaurants is held by institutions. High institutional ownership can be a signal of strong market trust in this company.

DRI Stock Analysis - Frequently Asked Questions

How have DRI shares performed this year?

Darden Restaurants' stock was trading at $186.69 at the start of the year. Since then, DRI stock has increased by 10.4% and is now trading at $206.0480.

How were Darden Restaurants' earnings last quarter?

Darden Restaurants, Inc. (NYSE:DRI) issued its quarterly earnings data on Friday, June, 20th. The restaurant operator reported $2.98 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $2.97 by $0.01. Darden Restaurants's quarterly revenue was up 10.6% on a year-over-year basis.
Read the conference call transcript.

How will Darden Restaurants' stock buyback program work?

Darden Restaurants' Board of Directors approved a stock buyback program on Friday, June 20th 2025, which authorizes the company to repurchase $1,000,000,000 in outstanding shares, according to EventVestor. This means that the company could buy up to 3.8% of its shares through open market purchases. Shares repurchase programs are typically an indication that the company's board believes its stock is undervalued.

Does Darden Restaurants have any subsidiaries?

The following companies are subsidiaries of Darden Restaurants: Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen, Yard House, Rare Hospitality Management, Bahama Breeze Holdings, Capital Grille Holdings, Cheddar’s Casual Café, Cheddar's Restaurant Holding Corp., and more.

Who are Darden Restaurants' major shareholders?

Top institutional investors of Darden Restaurants include J. Safra Sarasin Holding AG (0.21%), US Bancorp DE (0.12%), Mirae Asset Global Investments Co. Ltd. (0.10%) and Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. (0.08%). Insiders that own company stock include Ricardo Cardenas, Todd Burrowes, Richard L Renninger, Daniel J Kiernan, Matthew R Broad, Melvin John Martin, Laura B Williamson, John W Madonna, William S Simon, Susan M Connelly, Rajesh Vennam, Sarah H King, Douglas J Milanes and Nana Mensah.
View institutional ownership trends.

How do I buy shares of Darden Restaurants?

Shares of DRI stock can be purchased through any online brokerage account. Popular online brokerages with access to the U.S. stock market include Charles Schwab, E*TRADE, Fidelity, and Vanguard Brokerage Services.

What other stocks do shareholders of Darden Restaurants own?

Based on aggregate information from My MarketBeat watchlists, some other companies that Darden Restaurants investors own include NVIDIA (NVDA), Meta Platforms (META), Salesforce (CRM), Broadcom (AVGO), Humana (HUM), Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and AbbVie (ABBV).

Company Calendar

• Record date for 5/1 Dividend: 4/10/2025
• Ex-Dividend for 5/1 Dividend: 4/10/2025
• Dividend Payable: 5/01/2025
• Last Earnings: 6/20/2025
• Record date for 8/1 Dividend: 7/10/2025
• Ex-Dividend for 8/1 Dividend: 7/10/2025
• Today: 7/24/2025
• Dividend Payable: 8/01/2025
• Next Earnings (Estimated): 9/18/2025
• Fiscal Year End: 5/31/2026

Industry, Sector and Symbol

• Stock Exchange: NYSE
• Sector: Retail/Wholesale
• Industry: RETAIL - RESTRNTS
• Sub-Industry: Restaurants
• Current Symbol: NYSE:DRI
• CIK: 940944
• Web: www.darden.com
• Phone: (407) 245-4000
• Fax: 407-245-4989
• Employees: 191,105
• Year Founded: 1968

Price Target and Rating

• Average Price Target for Darden Restaurants: $225.19
• High Price Target: $255.00
• Low Price Target: $150.00
• Potential Upside/Downside: +8.0%
• Consensus Rating: Moderate Buy
• Rating Score (0-4): 2.59
• Research Coverage: 27 Analysts

Profitability

• EPS (Trailing Twelve Months): $8.88
• Trailing P/E Ratio: 23.48
• Forward P/E Ratio: 21.90
• P/E Growth: 1.93
• Net Income: $1.05 billion
• Net Margins: 8.69%
• Pretax Margin: 9.83%
• Return on Equity: 51.81%
• Return on Assets: 9.23%

Debt

• Debt-to-Equity Ratio: 0.92
• Current Ratio: 0.42
• Quick Ratio: 0.28

Sales & Book Value

• Annual Sales: $12.08 billion
• Price / Sales: 2.02
• Cash Flow: $14.02 per share
• Price / Cash Flow: 14.87
• Book Value: $19.75 per share
• Price / Book: 10.56

Miscellaneous

• Outstanding Shares: 117,030,000
• Free Float: 116,355,000
• Market Cap: $24.40 billion
• Optionable: Optionable
• Beta: 0.74