Darden Restaurants’ (DRI) Equal Weight Rating Reiterated at Stephens

Darden Restaurants (NYSE:DRI)‘s stock had its “equal weight” rating reaffirmed by research analysts at Stephens in a research report issued on Thursday,Benzinga reports. They currently have a $205.00 price objective on the restaurant operator’s stock. Stephens’ price target points to a potential upside of 0.64% from the stock’s current price.

Several other equities analysts also recently weighed in on the company. Evercore reaffirmed an “outperform” rating on shares of Darden Restaurants in a research report on Friday, December 19th. UBS Group restated a “buy” rating and issued a $230.00 price target on shares of Darden Restaurants in a research note on Tuesday. Barclays lowered their target price on Darden Restaurants from $230.00 to $227.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, January 7th. Mizuho raised Darden Restaurants from a “neutral” rating to an “outperform” rating and boosted their price objective for the stock from $195.00 to $235.00 in a research report on Friday, January 23rd. Finally, KeyCorp reiterated an “overweight” rating on shares of Darden Restaurants in a report on Friday, December 19th. Twenty investment analysts have rated the stock with a Buy rating and nine have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $224.33.

Darden Restaurants Stock Performance

Shares of Darden Restaurants stock opened at $203.69 on Thursday. The firm has a market cap of $23.45 billion, a PE ratio of 21.35, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.95 and a beta of 0.61. The company has a quick ratio of 0.26, a current ratio of 0.39 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 1.03. Darden Restaurants has a 52 week low of $169.00 and a 52 week high of $228.27. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $207.09 and its 200-day simple moving average is $194.76.

Darden Restaurants (NYSE:DRI) last posted its earnings results on Thursday, December 18th. The restaurant operator reported $2.08 EPS for the quarter, missing analysts’ consensus estimates of $2.10 by ($0.02). The company had revenue of $3.10 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.07 billion. Darden Restaurants had a net margin of 8.92% and a return on equity of 52.44%. The company’s quarterly revenue was up 7.3% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the company earned $2.03 EPS. Darden Restaurants has set its FY 2026 guidance at 10.500-10.700 EPS. Equities analysts forecast that Darden Restaurants will post 9.52 earnings per share for the current year.

Insider Transactions at Darden Restaurants

In other news, insider Todd Burrowes sold 7,103 shares of Darden Restaurants stock in a transaction on Tuesday, January 13th. The shares were sold at an average price of $207.12, for a total value of $1,471,173.36. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 44,252 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $9,165,474.24. The trade was a 13.83% decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available through this link. Also, insider John W. Wilkerson sold 2,258 shares of Darden Restaurants stock in a transaction on Friday, January 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $213.00, for a total transaction of $480,954.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider owned 17,784 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,787,992. This represents a 11.27% decrease in their ownership of the stock. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. Insiders sold a total of 18,770 shares of company stock valued at $3,948,970 over the last ninety days. 0.49% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Darden Restaurants

Several hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Twin Peaks Wealth Advisors LLC acquired a new stake in Darden Restaurants in the second quarter valued at about $26,000. Elevation Point Wealth Partners LLC acquired a new stake in Darden Restaurants in the second quarter valued at $29,000. Quent Capital LLC acquired a new position in shares of Darden Restaurants during the 3rd quarter worth $27,000. Torren Management LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Darden Restaurants in the fourth quarter valued at about $26,000. Finally, Union Savings Bank acquired a new position in Darden Restaurants during the fourth quarter worth about $28,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 93.64% of the company’s stock.

About Darden Restaurants

Darden Restaurants, Inc is a multi-brand, full-service restaurant company headquartered in Orlando, Florida. The company owns and operates a portfolio of casual and fine-dining concepts that together serve millions of guests through company-owned and franchised locations. Its well-known brands include Olive Garden and LongHorn Steakhouse, alongside other dining concepts that span Italian, American, steakhouse and upscale casual formats.

Darden’s restaurants provide a range of guest-facing services including dine-in, takeout, delivery and catering, and feature menus tailored to each brand’s positioning—Italian-American fare at Olive Garden, steaks and grilled items at LongHorn, and more premium steakhouse and chef-driven offerings at its upscale concepts.