Stratos Wealth Partners LTD. Reduces Stock Holdings in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM)

Stratos Wealth Partners LTD. reduced its stake in shares of Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) by 8.3% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The firm owned 8,511 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after selling 772 shares during the quarter. Stratos Wealth Partners LTD.’s holdings in Yum! Brands were worth $1,142,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in YUM. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its stake in 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 buying an additional 111,147 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its holdings in shares of Yum! Brands by 0.4% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 1,632,862 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $228,127,000 after acquiring an additional 6,537 shares during the period. Cantillon Capital Management LLC lifted its stake in shares of Yum! Brands by 3.8% in 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 purchasing an additional 51,690 shares during the period. Swiss National Bank boosted 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 valued at $116,770,000 after purchasing an additional 2,800 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Group Inc. grew its stake in 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 purchasing an additional 20,966 shares during the period. 82.37% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of analysts have recently commented on the stock. Citigroup restated a “neutral” rating and set a $141.00 target price (down previously from $153.00) on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Friday, January 10th. Redburn Atlantic lowered shares of Yum! Brands from a “strong-buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Monday, November 11th. TD Securities raised their target price on shares of Yum! Brands from $140.00 to $151.00 and gave the company a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday. Sanford C. Bernstein cut Yum! Brands from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating and dropped their price target for the stock from $140.00 to $135.00 in a research report on Wednesday, January 22nd. Finally, Bank of America reduced their price objective on Yum! Brands from $147.00 to $145.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, October 22nd. Thirteen investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and six have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Hold” and an average price target of $147.37.

Insider Activity at Yum! Brands

In related news, CEO David W. Gibbs sold 7,059 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred 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 directly owns 149,385 shares in the company, valued at approximately $20,307,396.90. The trade was a 4.51 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. 0.31% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Yum! Brands Stock Down 0.4 %

Shares of Yum! Brands stock opened at $143.49 on Monday. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a twelve month low of $122.13 and a twelve month high of $144.71. The company has a market cap of $40.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.49, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.36 and a beta of 1.10. The company’s 50 day moving average is $132.37 and its 200 day moving average is $133.88.

Yum! Brands Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, March 7th. Investors of record on Friday, February 21st will be issued a $0.71 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, February 21st. This represents a $2.84 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.98%. This is a positive change from Yum! Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.67. Yum! Brands’s payout ratio is presently 51.34%.

Yum! Brands 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.