Yum! Brands (YUM) Stock Price, News & Analysis

Company Overview

Yum! Brands, Inc. is a global restaurant company that develops, operates and franchises quick-service restaurants. Its portfolio includes KFC, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut and The Habit Burger Grill, which offer products such as fried and grilled chicken, tacos and other Mexican-inspired foods, pizza, burgers and related menu items.

The company’s restaurants serve customers through a combination of company-operated locations and franchised and licensed outlets. Yum! Brands supports its restaurant concepts with brand management, franchise services, technology and digital ordering capabilities, while franchisees generally manage day-to-day restaurant operations.

Yum! Brands serves customers in numerous markets worldwide, with a significant presence in the United States and international markets across regions including Asia, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa. The company was formed in 1997 when PepsiCo separated its restaurant businesses, and it adopted the Yum! Brands name in 2002 after operating as Tricon Global Restaurants.

Key Stats

• Today's Range: $137.46 to $140.62
• 50-Day Range: $135.98 to $157.42
• 52-Week Range: $134.26 to $170.14
• Volume: 1.54 million shs
• Average Volume: 2.15 million shs
• Market Capitalization: $37.69 billion
• P/E Ratio: 17.36
• Dividend Yield: 2.17%
• Price Target: $174.67
• Consensus Rating: Moderate Buy

Yum! Brands Stock Analysis - MarketRank™

Yum! Brands scored higher than 97% of companies evaluated by MarketBeat, and ranked 43rd out of 474 stocks in the consumer discretionary sector. Scores are calculated by averaging available category scores, with extra weight given to analysis and valuation.

Analyst's Opinion

• Score: 4.3 / 5
• Analyst Rating: Moderate Buy

Consensus Rating

Yum! Brands has received a consensus rating of Moderate Buy. The company's average rating score is 2.57, and is based on no strong buy ratings, 13 buy ratings, 7 hold ratings, and 1 sell rating.

Upside Potential

Yum! Brands has a consensus price target of $174.67, representing about 27.0% upside from its current price of $137.58.

Amount of Analyst Coverage

Yum! Brands has been the subject of 9 research reports in the past 90 days, demonstrating strong analyst interest in this stock.

Earnings and Valuation

• Score: 2.5 / 5
• Proj. Earnings Growth: 9.58%

Earnings Growth

Earnings for Yum! Brands are expected to grow by 9.58% in the coming year, from $6.47 to $7.09 per share.

Price to Earnings Ratio vs. the Market

The P/E ratio of Yum! Brands is 17.31, which means that it is trading at a less expensive P/E ratio than the market average P/E ratio of about 38.95.

Price to Earnings Ratio vs. Sector

The P/E ratio of Yum! Brands is 17.31, which means that it is trading at a less expensive P/E ratio than the Consumer Discretionary sector average P/E ratio of about 44.07.

Price to Earnings Growth Ratio

Yum! Brands has a PEG Ratio of 2.23. PEG Ratios above 1 indicate that a company could be overvalued.

Short Interest

• Score: 3.0 / 5
• Short Interest Level: Healthy

Percentage of Shares Shorted

3.26% of the float of Yum! Brands has been sold short.

Short Interest Ratio / Days to Cover

Yum! Brands has a short interest ratio ("days to cover") of 3.53, which is generally considered an acceptable ratio of short interest to trading volume.

Change versus previous month

Short interest in Yum! Brands has recently increased by 2.94%, indicating that investor sentiment is decreasing.

Dividend

• Score: 3.3 / 5
• Dividend Strength: Strong

Dividend Yield

Yum! Brands pays a meaningful dividend of 2.15%, higher than the bottom 25% of all stocks that pay dividends.

Dividend Growth

Yum! Brands has been increasing its dividend for 8 years.

Dividend Coverage

The dividend payout ratio of Yum! Brands is 37.74%. This payout ratio is at a healthy, sustainable level, below 75%.

Dividend Sustainability

Based on earnings estimates, Yum! Brands will have a dividend payout ratio of 42.31% next year. This indicates that Yum! Brands will be able to sustain or increase its dividend.

News and Social Media

• Score: 2.7 / 5
• News Sentiment: 0.33

News Sentiment

Yum! Brands has a news sentiment score of 0.33. 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 lower news sentiment than the 0.46 average news sentiment score of Consumer Discretionary companies.

News Coverage This Week

MarketBeat has tracked 19 news articles for Yum! Brands this week, compared to 9 articles on an average week.

Search Interest

38 people have searched for YUM on MarketBeat in the last 30 days. This is an increase of 6% compared to the previous 30 days.

MarketBeat Follows

Only 5 people have added Yum! Brands to their MarketBeat watchlist in the last 30 days. This is a decrease of 0% compared to the previous 30 days.

Company Ownership

• Score: 1.4 / 5
• Insider Trading: Selling Shares

Insider Buying vs. Insider Selling

In the past three months, Yum! Brands insiders have sold more of their company's stock than they have bought. Specifically, they have bought $0.00 in company stock and sold $2,940,693.00 in company stock.

Percentage Held by Insiders

0.14% of the stock of Yum! Brands is held by insiders.

Percentage Held by Institutions

82.37% of the stock of Yum! Brands is held by institutions. High institutional ownership can be a signal of strong market trust in this company.

Company Calendar

• Last Earnings: 7/30/2026
• Record date for 9/18 Dividend: 9/09/2026
• Ex-Dividend for 9/18 Dividend: 9/09/2026
• Dividend Payable: 9/18/2026
• Today: 9/24/2026
• Next Earnings (Estimated): 11/03/2026
• Fiscal Year End: 12/31/2026

Industry, Sector and Symbol

• Stock Exchange: NYSE
• Sector: Consumer Discretionary
• Industry: Hotels, Restaurants & Leisure
• Sub-Industry: Restaurants
• Current Symbol: NYSE:YUM
• CIK: 1041061
• Web: www.yum.com
• Phone: (502) 874-8300
• Fax: 502-874-8323
• Employees: 49,000
• Year Founded: 1997

Price Target and Rating

• Average Price Target for Yum! Brands: $174.67
• High Price Target: $190.00
• Low Price Target: $158.00
• Potential Upside/Downside: +26.1%
• Consensus Rating: Moderate Buy
• Rating Score (0-4): 2.57
• Research Coverage: 21 Analysts

Profitability

• EPS (Trailing Twelve Months): $7.95
• Trailing P/E Ratio: 17.41
• Forward P/E Ratio: 21.40
• P/E Growth: 2.23
• Net Income: $1.56 billion
• Net Margins: 25.42%
• Pretax Margin: 25.20%
• Return on Equity: -24.57%
• Return on Assets: 22.24%

Debt

• Debt-to-Equity Ratio: N/A
• Current Ratio: 0.59
• Quick Ratio: 0.59

Sales & Book Value

• Annual Sales: $8.72 billion
• Price / Sales: 4.33
• Cash Flow: $6.80 per share
• Price / Cash Flow: 20.35
• Book Value: ($26.38) per share
• Price / Book: -5.25

Miscellaneous

• Outstanding Shares: 272,901,000
• Free Float: 272,519,000
• Market Cap: $37.79 billion
• Optionable: Optionable
• Beta: 0.55