Yum! Brands Q4 Profit Tops Street - Update

(RTTNews) - Restaurant operator Yum! Brands Inc. (YUM), Wednesday reported a profit for the fourth quarter that topped Wall Street estimates, while revenues fell short of expectations.

Louisville, Kentucky-based Yum! Brands reported fourth-quarter profit of $275 million or $0.63 per share compared with a loss of $86 million or $0.20 per share last year.

Adjusted earnings rose to $0.68 per share from $0.61 per share last year. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected earnings of $0.66 per share. Analysts' estimates typically exclude special items.

Yum Brands, the parent company of Taco Bell, KFC and Pizza Hut, said total revenues inched down 1 percent to $3.95 billion from $4.00 billion last year. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $4.02 billion for the quarter.

Yum Brands, which is spinning off its China business, said worldwide system sales grew 6 percent, while its worldwide restaurant margin increased 3.4 percentage points to 13.6 percent.

New global restaurants totaled 1,160, including 384 in China, 374 at KFC, 270 at Pizza Hut, 109 at Taco Bell and 23 in India.

China system sales increased 7 percent, driven by 7 percent unit growth and 2 percent same-store sales growth.

A Shanghai court recently fined three local tech firms for helping spread rumors about KFC chain that included doctored photos of deformed chickens and allegations that the birds had six wings and eight legs.

In December, Yum Brands revealed its plans to return up to $6.2 billion to shareholders before completing the separation of its China business, which is expected by the end of 2016.

Yum Brands made the decision to spin off its struggling China division after it was hit by food scandals in China.

YUM closed Tuesday's trading at $72.45, up $0.13 or 0.18%, on the NYSE. The stock further dropped $1.00 or 1.38% in the after-hours trade.