Woodline Partners LP Invests $564,000 in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM)

Woodline Partners LP purchased a new position in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM - Free Report) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor purchased 4,207 shares of the restaurant operator's stock, valued at approximately $564,000.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently modified their holdings of YUM. Vident Advisory LLC boosted its stake in Yum! Brands by 5.7% during the fourth quarter. Vident Advisory LLC now owns 6,212 shares of the restaurant operator's stock valued at $833,000 after buying an additional 334 shares in the last quarter. Texas Bank & Trust Co bought a new position in Yum! Brands during the fourth quarter valued at about $256,000. Toronto Dominion Bank boosted its stake in Yum! Brands by 2.6% during the fourth quarter. Toronto Dominion Bank now owns 130,808 shares of the restaurant operator's stock valued at $17,549,000 after buying an additional 3,362 shares in the last quarter. Scissortail Wealth Management LLC boosted its stake in Yum! Brands by 33,833.3% during the fourth quarter. Scissortail Wealth Management LLC now owns 2,036 shares of the restaurant operator's stock valued at $273,000 after buying an additional 2,030 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Snowden Capital Advisors LLC boosted its stake in Yum! Brands by 4.2% during the fourth quarter. Snowden Capital Advisors LLC now owns 37,775 shares of the restaurant operator's stock valued at $5,068,000 after buying an additional 1,507 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors own 82.37% of the company's stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages have recently commented on YUM. Evercore ISI upped their target price on Yum! Brands from $160.00 to $170.00 and gave the company an "in-line" rating in a report on Thursday, May 1st. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on Yum! Brands from $160.00 to $170.00 and gave the company a "neutral" rating in a report on Monday, May 5th. Guggenheim upped their target price on Yum! Brands from $155.00 to $165.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a report on Tuesday, April 8th. TD Securities reaffirmed a "hold" rating and set a $158.00 target price on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Wednesday, April 30th. Finally, TD Cowen reaffirmed a "hold" rating and set a $140.00 target price on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Thursday, February 6th. Sixteen analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of "Hold" and an average price target of $156.70.

Yum! Brands Stock Down 0.2%

Shares of YUM traded down $0.22 during midday trading on Friday, reaching $143.82. 3,184,350 shares of the stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 2,016,302. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a 12-month low of $122.13 and a 12-month high of $163.30. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $147.66 and a 200-day simple moving average of $142.73. The company has a market cap of $39.98 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.55, a P/E/G ratio of 2.31 and a beta of 0.77.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM - Get Free Report) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 30th. The restaurant operator reported $1.30 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $1.29 by $0.01. Yum! Brands had a negative return on equity of 20.33% and a net margin of 19.68%. The company had revenue of $1.79 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.85 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $1.15 EPS. The business's quarterly revenue was up 11.8% on a year-over-year basis. Research analysts expect that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 5.94 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Yum! Brands Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, June 6th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, May 27th will be issued a dividend of $0.71 per share. The ex-dividend date is Tuesday, May 27th. This represents a $2.84 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.97%. Yum! Brands's dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 56.57%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Yum! Brands

In other Yum! Brands news, CEO David W. Gibbs sold 30,604 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $159.46, for a total transaction of $4,880,113.84. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 160,296 shares in the company, valued at $25,560,800.16. This trade represents a 16.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, COO Tracy L. Skeans sold 8,638 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, March 6th. The shares were sold at an average price of $158.36, for a total value of $1,367,913.68. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 2,970 shares in the company, valued at approximately $470,329.20. This trade represents a 74.41% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 62,334 shares of company stock worth $9,734,737 over the last 90 days. Insiders own 0.33% of the company's stock.

About Yum! Brands

Yum! Brands, Inc, together with its subsidiaries, develops, operates, and franchises quick service restaurants worldwide. The company operates through the KFC Division, the Taco Bell Division, the Pizza Hut Division, and the Habit Burger Grill Division segments. It also operates restaurants under the KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, and The Habit Burger Grill brands, which specialize in chicken, pizza, made-to-order chargrilled burgers, sandwiches, Mexican-style food categories, and other food products.