Chesley Taft & Associates LLC Lowers Holdings in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM)

Chesley Taft & Associates LLC lowered its position in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) by 46.8% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 1,594 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after selling 1,400 shares during the quarter. Chesley Taft & Associates LLC’s holdings in Yum! Brands were worth $251,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of YUM. Kohmann Bosshard Financial Services LLC purchased a new position in Yum! Brands during the 4th quarter valued at about $25,000. WealthTrak Capital Management LLC bought a new position in shares of Yum! Brands during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $25,000. Halbert Hargrove Global Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Yum! Brands during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $33,000. Itau Unibanco Holding S.A. increased its holdings in Yum! Brands by 436.5% during the fourth quarter. Itau Unibanco Holding S.A. now owns 279 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $37,000 after buying an additional 227 shares during the period. Finally, LGT Financial Advisors LLC bought a new position in Yum! Brands in the fourth quarter worth approximately $41,000. Institutional investors own 82.37% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

Several analysts have issued reports on the company. Stifel Nicolaus increased their target price on Yum! Brands from $130.00 to $148.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, February 28th. Robert W. Baird decreased their price objective on Yum! Brands from $176.00 to $174.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research note on Monday, April 7th. Cowen reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Yum! Brands in a research report on Wednesday, March 5th. Citigroup lifted their target price on Yum! Brands from $148.00 to $151.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 15th. Finally, UBS Group increased their price target on shares of Yum! Brands from $156.00 to $165.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 7th. Fifteen research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average target price of $157.30.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO David W. Gibbs sold 5,139 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, April 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $146.70, for a total value of $753,891.30. Following the sale, the chief executive officer now owns 157,893 shares in the company, valued at $23,162,903.10. This represents a 3.15% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CEO Scott Mezvinsky sold 268 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, June 4th. The shares were sold at an average price of $145.97, for a total transaction of $39,119.96. Following the transaction, the chief executive officer now owns 1,755 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $256,177.35. This represents a 13.25% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 17,763 shares of company stock valued at $2,637,564. 0.33% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Yum! Brands Trading Up 1.4%

NYSE:YUM opened at $144.92 on Friday. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a twelve month low of $122.13 and a twelve month high of $163.30. The company has a market cap of $40.28 billion, a PE ratio of 27.76, a P/E/G ratio of 2.31 and a beta of 0.74. The company’s 50 day moving average is $146.31 and its two-hundred day moving average is $143.02.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 30th. The restaurant operator reported $1.30 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $1.29 by $0.01. The firm had revenue of $1.79 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $1.85 billion. Yum! Brands had a net margin of 19.68% and a negative return on equity of 20.33%. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 11.8% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $1.15 earnings per share. As a group, analysts expect that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 5.94 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Yum! Brands Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, June 6th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, May 27th were given a dividend of $0.71 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, May 27th. This represents a $2.84 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.96%. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio is currently 56.57%.

Yum! Brands Company Profile

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.