Inspire Investing LLC Invests $809,000 in Yum China Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:YUMC)

Inspire Investing LLC acquired a new position in Yum China Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:YUMC) in the fourth quarter, HoldingsChannel.com reports. The institutional investor acquired 16,798 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $809,000.

A number of other hedge funds have also recently made changes to their positions in the business. FMR LLC boosted its stake in Yum China by 4,176.5% during the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 3,588,977 shares of the company’s stock valued at $161,576,000 after buying an additional 3,505,053 shares during the last quarter. Waverton Investment Management Ltd boosted its stake in Yum China by 350.7% during the third quarter. Waverton Investment Management Ltd now owns 4,203,087 shares of the company’s stock valued at $189,202,000 after buying an additional 3,270,560 shares during the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. boosted its stake in Yum China by 49.6% during the third quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 7,865,803 shares of the company’s stock valued at $356,206,000 after buying an additional 2,609,494 shares during the last quarter. Temasek Holdings Private Ltd boosted its stake in Yum China by 61.4% during the third quarter. Temasek Holdings Private Ltd now owns 2,942,959 shares of the company’s stock valued at $132,492,000 after buying an additional 1,120,054 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Hhlr Advisors LTD. bought a new position in Yum China during the third quarter valued at approximately $29,977,000. Institutional investors own 85.58% of the company’s stock.

Yum China Price Performance

NYSE:YUMC opened at $46.03 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $17.48 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 20.37, a PEG ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 0.35. Yum China Holdings, Inc. has a 1 year low of $28.50 and a 1 year high of $52.00. The business has a 50 day simple moving average of $46.94 and a 200-day simple moving average of $41.28. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.01, a current ratio of 1.29 and a quick ratio of 1.15.

Yum China (NYSE:YUMC) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Monday, November 4th. The company reported $0.77 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $0.68 by $0.09. The business had revenue of $3.07 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.03 billion. Yum China had a return on equity of 13.39% and a net margin of 7.97%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.4% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the company earned $0.59 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Yum China Holdings, Inc. will post 2.33 EPS for the current year.

Yum China Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, December 17th. Stockholders of record on Tuesday, November 26th were issued a $0.16 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, November 26th. This represents a $0.64 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.39%. Yum China’s payout ratio is 28.32%.

Insider Transactions at Yum China

In other news, insider Duoduo (Howard) Huang sold 6,377 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $47.47, for a total value of $302,716.19. Following the sale, the insider now directly owns 16,641 shares in the company, valued at approximately $789,948.27. This represents a 27.70 % 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. Company insiders own 0.30% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of brokerages recently commented on YUMC. Citigroup raised Yum China to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Monday, September 30th. StockNews.com lowered Yum China from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Friday. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised Yum China from a “neutral” rating to an “overweight” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $35.50 to $60.00 in a research note on Tuesday, November 5th. One equities research analyst has rated the stock with a hold rating, three have issued a buy rating and one has given a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, Yum China presently has an average rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $49.57.

About Yum China

Yum China Holdings, Inc owns, operates, and franchises restaurants in the People's Republic of China. The company operates through KFC, Pizza Hut, and All Other segments. It operates restaurants under the KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell, Lavazza, Little Sheep, and Huang Ji Huang concepts. The company also operates V-Gold Mall, a mobile e-commerce platform to sell products; and offers online food deliver services.