Updating our Q4E Kalinowski Restaurant Industry Same-Store Sales Index

By Mark Kalinowski Published on January 25, 2021 at 12:00 AM

With this report, we update our data-driven Kalinowski Restaurant Industry Index for Q4E to -2.4%. While this is a lot better than Q2 2020’s -17.5%, and similar to Q3 2020’s -2.0%, it is somewhat disappointing in the context that as of mid-October we thought there was a 40% chance that Q4 2020 would turn positive. That was not meant to be.

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YUM (Post-Call) All Three Larger U.S. Brands Posting Positive Comps in July

By Mark Kalinowski Published on July 30, 2020 at 12:00 AM

Earlier today, Yum Brands (YUM; Neutral, $91.46) reported that its adjusted Q2 EPS came to $0.82, well ahead of our $0.55 forecast and sell-side consensus (according to Consensus Metrix) of $0.57. The $0.82 figure included a +21 cent benefit related to Yum’s investment in Grubhub (GRUB; Not Rated). Adjusted EPS would have been about $0.61 excluding the mark-to-market for this investment.

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WEN Beefing Up Some Estimates

By Mark Kalinowski Published on June 8, 2020 at 12:00 AM

After today’s market close, Wendy’s (WEN; Neutral, $22.65) published a business update, including a -1.9% U.S. same-store sales number for May 4-31, and noting that global same-store sales “for the last week of May turned positive in the low-single digit range.” This strongly suggests that U.S. same-store sales were positive the last week of May, as U.S. same-store sales have been running ahead of global same-store sales by roughly 130-140 basis points as of late.

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