Legal & General Group Plc Has $341.72 Million Position in Yum! Brands, Inc. $YUM

Legal & General Group Plc lifted its stake in Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE:YUM) by 6.1% in the 3rd quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 2,248,162 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock after buying an additional 129,966 shares during the period. Legal & General Group Plc’s holdings in Yum! Brands were worth $341,721,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Brighton Jones LLC grew its holdings in shares of Yum! Brands by 8.0% during the 4th quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 7,861 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $1,055,000 after purchasing an additional 583 shares in the last quarter. Prospera Financial Services Inc raised its stake in shares of Yum! Brands by 3.2% in the second quarter. Prospera Financial Services Inc now owns 7,195 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock valued at $1,067,000 after purchasing an additional 223 shares in the last quarter. Midwest Trust Co acquired a new position in shares of Yum! Brands in the second quarter valued at $697,000. ProShare Advisors LLC lifted its position in Yum! Brands by 12.4% in the second quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 47,475 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $7,035,000 after purchasing an additional 5,225 shares during the period. Finally, Allworth Financial LP lifted its position in Yum! Brands by 36.6% in the second quarter. Allworth Financial LP now owns 14,107 shares of the restaurant operator’s stock worth $2,090,000 after purchasing an additional 3,778 shares during the period. 82.37% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

More Yum! Brands News

Here are the key news stories impacting Yum! Brands this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Pizza Hut rolled out “Hut Crust,” a marketing and menu push (new Hand‑Tossed recipe + $10 large three‑topping offer) aimed at driving traffic and mix improvement — a consumer-facing initiative that can help sales and franchisee cash flow. PIZZA HUT LAUNCHES HUT CRUST PLATFORM FOR CRUST LOVERS & SETS OUT TO HIRE FIRST-OF-ITS-KIND HUT CRUST CONNOISSEUR
• Positive Sentiment: Yum!’s reported Q4 strength (revenue and comp-sales beats, operating profit up, and ~4,500 net new restaurant openings across KFC/Taco Bell/Pizza Hut) reinforces its scalable, franchise‑led growth story and supports medium‑term earnings upside. Did Yum!’s Q4 Beat and 4,500 New Openings Just Shift Yum! Brands’ (YUM) Investment Narrative?
• Neutral Sentiment: Sector & earnings roundups put Yum! in context with peers — useful framing for investors but not an immediate catalyst. Q4 Earnings Roundup: Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) And The Rest Of The Traditional Fast Food Segment
• Neutral Sentiment: Franchisee-level activity in key markets (Collins Foods acquiring KFC outlets in Germany; Devyani consolidating subsidiaries in India) signals brand expansion via partners — positive for global footprint but has limited immediate impact on YUM’s corporate earnings. Collins Foods to acquire eight KFC outlets in Germany Devyani International to merge three subsidiaries with parent company
• Negative Sentiment: Coverage highlighting Yum!’s underperformance vs. the Dow and relative weakness over the past year is pressuring sentiment — analysts remain moderately upbeat, but valuation (P/E ~28) and comparisons to faster-growing peers leave limited room for error, contributing to today’s pullback. Is Yum! Brands Stock Underperforming the Dow? Is Yum! Brands Stock Underperforming the Dow? (Yahoo)

Yum! Brands Price Performance

Yum! Brands stock opened at $156.56 on Thursday. The firm has a market capitalization of $43.28 billion, a P/E ratio of 28.21, a P/E/G ratio of 2.24 and a beta of 0.64. The stock has a fifty day moving average price of $158.35 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $151.71. Yum! Brands, Inc. has a 52-week low of $137.33 and a 52-week high of $169.39.

Yum! Brands (NYSE:YUM) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, February 4th. The restaurant operator reported $1.73 EPS for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $1.76 by ($0.03). Yum! Brands had a net margin of 18.98% and a negative return on equity of 22.42%. The firm had revenue of $2.52 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $2.45 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $1.61 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 6.4% on a year-over-year basis. On average, equities research analysts predict that Yum! Brands, Inc. will post 5.94 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Yum! Brands Increases Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, March 6th. Shareholders of record on Friday, February 20th were given a $0.75 dividend. This represents a $3.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.9%. This is a boost from Yum! Brands’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.71. The ex-dividend date was Friday, February 20th. Yum! Brands’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 54.05%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, CEO Christopher Lee Turner sold 242 shares of Yum! Brands stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 26th. The shares were sold at an average price of $166.02, for a total value of $40,176.84. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief executive officer owned 65,297 shares in the company, valued at approximately $10,840,607.94. The trade was a 0.37% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, CEO Scott Mezvinsky sold 284 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $166.02, for a total value of $47,149.68. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Over the last ninety days, insiders have sold 14,138 shares of company stock valued at $2,289,990. 0.33% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Analyst Ratings Changes

YUM has been the topic of several analyst reports. Weiss Ratings reissued a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Yum! Brands in a report on Monday, December 29th. Citigroup lifted their target price on shares of Yum! Brands from $170.00 to $171.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research report on Thursday, February 5th. Evercore reissued an “outperform” rating and issued a $190.00 target price on shares of Yum! Brands in a research note on Friday, February 13th. BMO Capital Markets reissued a “market perform” rating and issued a $165.00 price target on shares of Yum! Brands in a research report on Thursday, February 5th. Finally, Oppenheimer cut shares of Yum! Brands from an “outperform” rating to a “market perform” rating in a research note on Tuesday, January 6th. Thirteen investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and eight have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $174.50.

Yum! Brands Profile

Yum! Brands, Inc (NYSE: YUM) is a global quick-service restaurant company that develops, operates and franchises a portfolio of well-known restaurant brands. The company’s principal brands are KFC, Pizza Hut and Taco Bell, each focused on distinct product categories—KFC on fried chicken and related menu items, Pizza Hut on pizza and complementary offerings, and Taco Bell on Mexican-inspired quick-service food. Yum! is headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky and was formed as Tricon Global Restaurants in 1997 when PepsiCo spun off its restaurant businesses, later adopting the Yum! Brands name.

The company’s operating model centers on brand development, system growth and franchising; a large portion of its restaurants are operated by independent franchisees, and Yum! generates revenue through franchise royalties and fees in addition to sales from company-operated locations.