RBC Capital Markets — "End of quarter thoughts: YUM, CMG, TXRH" — April 7, 2026 — Rating: Outperform (reiterated) · PT $50 (37x P/'27E) · FY26 SSS raised to +1.1%
SEC Menu price increases have decelerated every year for four years: +12.0% in '22, +5.2% in '23, +2.9% in '24, and +2.1% in '25. The FY26 1–2% pricing posture is consistent with this glide path, suggesting management is not reaching for a new lever to hit guidance — so any upside must come from the conservatism embedded in volumes.
Q3'25 comps printed +0.3% — the first positive quarterly print since Q4'24. Sequential improvement is real and gives management a credible base from which to talk down expectations.
SEC FY25 SSS came in at -1.7% — the first negative annual comp in at least a decade. Even FY20 (COVID) printed +1.8%. This is a structural break, not a rounding error, and the same management team that cut '25 guidance three times is now telling investors '26 is conservative.
RBC RBC's own bar case acknowledges January '26 was tracking -1% to -2% — meaning the +1.1% FY26 estimate requires a 200–300 bps acceleration from the current run-rate in a single quarter. The "conservatism" trade was wrong in '25 and requires a turn the filings don't yet support.
SEC The Q2'25 comp of -4.0% confirms the step-down narrative directionally — a 360 bps deceleration from Q1'25's -0.4%. That is a genuinely low bar to lap, and if Q2'26 simply returns to flat traffic, the mechanical comp improvement is material.
The Q3'25 sequential improvement to +0.3% (from Q2's -4.0%) is the single most constructive data point in the set. It suggests the bleeding has at least paused.
SEC Decomposing the comps reveals traffic is the problem, not ticket. Transactions ran -2.3% in Q1'25, -4.9% in Q2'25, and -0.8% in Q3'25 — three straight quarters of negative traffic. "Easier compares" is a math observation; whether the +0.3% Q3'25 SSS turns into +1%+ FY26 depends on traffic actually inflecting positive.
RBC RBC's acknowledgement that Jan '26 is still tracking -1% to -2% (even with weather) means traffic has not yet inflected against the easier lap. This is the second quarter where the "compares get easier" call has been made; Q1'26 will be the first test of whether it translates.
SEC The mechanism is plausible. CMG's productivity ceiling is its peak-hour prep capacity, and Q3'25's return to +0.3% SSS did coincide with an installed base crossing ~275 retrofitted stores (per the report). If the retrofit cadence accelerates to 1,375 in '26, the roll-forward is directionally supportive even if the magnitude is overstated.
The '25 restaurant count of ~4,000 US stores gives RBC a clean denominator for its retrofit math. The rollout pace itself (350 openings/year + retrofits) is operationally achievable.
SEC The empirical test of "200-400 bps per store" is whether it shows up on the partially-installed '25 base. It does not. Labor as a % of revenue deleveraged from 24.7% in FY24 to 25.1% in FY25. And trailing AUV fell from $3.21M in '24 to $3.10M in '25 — a 3.4% decline in the per-store run-rate.
If retrofits were already delivering the promised throughput gains, you'd expect something in aggregate labor productivity or AUV — a partial offset, a smaller decline, anything. What you see is the opposite: both metrics moved the wrong direction even as the first 275 stores were installed. The 40–80 bps '26 uplift is a pure analyst assumption without empirical anchor in the filings.
SEC The ~60 bps Q1 and 1–2% FY26 pricing trajectory is perfectly consistent with the four-year deceleration in SEC-disclosed annual menu price increases: 12.0% → 5.2% → 2.9% → 2.1%. The RBC Elements data point is directionally corroborated by the filings — this is the cleanest of the five claims.
Holding pricing discipline (rather than reaching for another 5% hike) protects the value gap vs QSR competitors — this is the right posture for a brand with -0.8% traffic in the most recent quarter.
SEC The report frames disciplined pricing as a positive. The filings tell a more ambiguous story: pricing has decelerated because CMG lost its pricing power, not because management chose restraint. With pricing at ~2% and traffic at -0.8%, the company has removed its main lever for defending SSS when traffic weakens. That is exactly what produced the -1.7% FY25 print.
Additionally, management disclosed an ongoing ~50 bps impact on food/beverage/packaging costs from tariffs enacted since April 2025. With pricing at ~1-2% and tariff pressure on COGS, the margin math gets tighter, not easier.
SEC US unit growth is on a durable trajectory: 3,400 stores in '23 → 3,700 in '24 → ~4,000 in '25. That ~300 units/year cadence is operationally credible and supports the ~8.5% company-wide growth through '26-'27 even if international contributes little.
The 10-K discloses a 2026 plan of approximately 10-15 new international partner-operated restaurants within a total system guide of ~350-370 openings. The partner model (Alshaya in Middle East; new LatAm/Asia partners) outsources real estate and operational learning, which is capital-light and faster to scale than the legacy company-owned international expansion.
SEC RBC's own illustrative math requires international licensed net adds to go from ~14 in '26 to ~135 in '30 — roughly a 10x step-up over four years. For context, the international partner-operated base reached 82 units by end-'24. Adding 135 net units in a single year (2030) exceeds the entire installed international base that took five-plus years to build.
RBC The 37x P/'27E multiple in the price target is essentially an option on this international ramp executing on schedule. If international merely grows in line with the current 10-15 units/year run-rate, total system growth compresses to mid-single-digits by '28-'29 and the multiple has no fundamental anchor. This is the valuation's thinnest leg.
The report gets the cleanest claim right. CMG's menu pricing has decelerated on a tight glide path from +12.0% in '22 to +2.1% in '25, and the RBC Elements ~60 bps Jan→Mar read lines up precisely with management's stated 1-2% FY26 posture. The compares-get-easier observation is also mechanically correct: Q2'25 comps of -4.0% are a genuinely low bar, and the Q3'25 sequential improvement to +0.3% is the single most constructive data point in the set — it at least suggests the bleeding has paused.
What the report overstates is the durability of the bull case's other three legs. First, the equipment uplift assumption (40–80 bps in '26, 80–160 bps in '27) is untested: the ~275 stores already retrofitted by end of '25 did not produce visible labor leverage — labor deleveraged from 24.7% to 25.1% — and AUV actually fell from $3.21M to $3.10M. Second, three straight quarters of negative transactions (-2.3%, -4.9%, -0.8%) mean the "easier compares" math only pays off if traffic actually inflects — and as of mid-January the report itself concedes the brand was still tracking -1% to -2%. Third, the 37x P/'27E multiple assumes an international ramp from ~14 net adds in '26 to ~135 by '30 — a 10x step-up from a base that took five years to reach 82 units. The single decision point for the stock: does the Q3'25 sequential turn in transactions extend into Q1'26, or reverse? If it extends, the analyst is right for the right reasons. If it reverses, the upgrade rests on an equipment uplift the filings don't yet show, a guidance beat that requires the same management to over-deliver after three cuts in a row, and an international ramp that has not yet begun.
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