Nilsine Partners LLC Purchases 349 Shares of Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM)

Nilsine Partners LLC lifted its position in shares of Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) by 5.2% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 7,067 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after acquiring an additional 349 shares during the quarter. Nilsine Partners LLC’s holdings in Yum! Brands were worth $948,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Geode Capital Management LLC increased its stake in shares of Yum! Brands by 1.5% in the third quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 7,441,170 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $1,038,775,000 after purchasing an additional 111,147 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its stake in Yum! Brands by 0.4% in the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 1,632,862 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $228,127,000 after buying an additional 6,537 shares in the last quarter. Cantillon Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in Yum! Brands by 3.8% during the 3rd quarter. Cantillon Capital Management LLC now owns 1,428,040 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $199,511,000 after acquiring an additional 51,690 shares during the period. Swiss National Bank lifted its position in shares of Yum! Brands by 0.3% during the third quarter. Swiss National Bank now owns 835,800 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $116,770,000 after acquiring an additional 2,800 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. boosted its holdings in shares of Yum! Brands by 3.1% in the third quarter. Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. now owns 689,631 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $96,348,000 after acquiring an additional 20,966 shares during the period. 82.37% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Yum! Brands Stock Down 1.3 %

Shares of NYSE:YUM opened at $129.15 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $36.04 billion, a PE ratio of 24.14, a PEG ratio of 2.02 and a beta of 1.11. The company’s fifty day moving average is $132.89 and its 200 day moving average is $133.60. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a 52 week low of $122.13 and a 52 week high of $143.20.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) last released its earnings results on Tuesday, November 5th. The restaurant operator reported $1.37 earnings per share for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.41 by ($0.04). Yum! Brands had a net margin of 21.13% and a negative return on equity of 18.93%. The company had revenue of $1.83 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $1.90 billion. During the same period last year, the firm posted $1.44 EPS. The company’s revenue was up 6.9% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts anticipate that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 5.46 EPS for the current year.

Yum! Brands Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, December 13th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 2nd were paid a dividend of $0.67 per share. This represents a $2.68 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 2.08%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 2nd. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 50.09%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of analysts recently issued reports on YUM shares. Oppenheimer boosted their price objective on Yum! Brands from $154.00 to $160.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 7th. Sanford C. Bernstein cut Yum! Brands from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and decreased their price target for the company from $140.00 to $135.00 in a research report on Wednesday, January 22nd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut their price objective on shares of Yum! Brands from $147.00 to $145.00 and set a “hold” rating for the company in a research report on Wednesday, November 6th. Redburn Atlantic cut shares of Yum! Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, November 11th. Finally, Argus upgraded shares of Yum! Brands from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $155.00 price target for the company in a research report on Tuesday, December 31st. Thirteen analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and five have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $144.89.

Insider Transactions at Yum! Brands

In other Yum! Brands news, CEO David W. Gibbs sold 7,059 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $135.94, for a total transaction of $959,600.46. Following the completion of the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 149,385 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $20,307,396.90. This represents a 4.51 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Company insiders own 0.31% 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.