Tag: Chipolte

Latest Headlines September 21, 2016September 28, 2016

Yum to issue 10M shares as part of China spinoff; Pizza Hut nabs Walmart exec for digital initiatives; and Kindred pays record $3M regulatory fine

A news summary focused on 10 big employers; updated 8:24 a.m.

YUM‘s 7,200-restaurant China Division said today it would issue 10 million common shares to Yum Brands shareholders as part of its planned spinoff next month. The offering could result in Yum China receiving proceeds of up to $54.05 million, implying a maximum offering price per share of $5.405, according to a regulatory filing. (bit.ly/2ctqkQy) The China division, which operates in more than 1,100 cities, is higher risk and potentially more rewarding, while Yum without the China division is likely to be more stable with greater cash flow (Reuters and SEC document).

PIZZA HUT has hired a Walmart technology executive to help develop digital ordering initiatives as its chief customer officer, a new position. The executive, Helen Vaid, will lead the international e-commerce, technology and operations business for the 16,000-location pizza chain. Vaid was Walmart’s vice president of digital store operations and experience. Before that, she was a general manager at Snapfish, a web-based photo-sharing and photo-printing company (press release).

KINDRED has paid a $3.1 million penalty to the federal government after failing to comply with a corporate integrity agreement it signed with regulators. The penalty came after the hospital and nursing home giant failed to correct improper billing practices in the fourth year of the five-year agreement. This penalty is the largest issued for corporate integrity violations to date, the Department of Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General said yesterday. The violations were discovered after several unannounced site visits were completed by the inspector general’s office. Under the agreement, Kindred had agreed to a number of corrective actions, including outside scrutiny of billing practices. In exchange for the agreement, the agency agreed not to exclude Kindred from participating in Medicare, Medicaid or other federal healthcare programs (Home Health Care News).

TACO BELL competitor Chipotle is launching a new marketing campaign today in a bid to convince people they can trust what’s in their burritos, nearly a year after two E. coli outbreaks sickened dozens of its customers in several states. In the campaign, the fast-Mexican chain says its now tracing ingredients back to the farm, blasting pathogens off chorizo with high-powered water jets, and requiring restaurant managers to receive food-safety certification (Wall Street Journal).

Latest Headlines August 18, 2016August 19, 2016

Pizza Hut adding 300-plus restaurants in Central Europe; Yum stock hits 52-week high; and White House in big new Obamacare push as Humana and Aetna flee exchanges

A news summary focused on 10 big employers; updated 6:11 p.m.

Pizza Hut restaurant building — Pizza Hut has more than 14,000 locations worldwide.

PIZZA HUT said it signed a master franchise agreement with AmRest Holdings that gives the Polish company the right to own, develop and sub-franchise more than 300 restaurants in Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Slovakia, and Slovenia over the next five years; AmRest already operates 80 Huts (press release).

Wall Street rallied around the news: YUM shares closed this afternoon at $90.76, after trading earlier at a 52-week high of $90.88.

The expansion comes as Yum CEO Greg Creed is on the offensive against rival Domino’s on the domestic front, especially in technology such as ordering apps that attracts younger consumers. Pizza Hut, headquartered in Plano outside Dallas, is the world’s biggest pizza chain, more than 14,00 restaurants in more than 100 countries. No. 2 Domino’s has more than 12,500 locations in over 80 markets around the world.

AmRest was launched in 1993 with its first Pizza Hut in Poland’s Wrocław and says it’s now the biggest independent chain restaurant operator in Central and Eastern Europe. It operates more than 1,000 eateries in 13 countries through a portfolio of brands that also includes KFC, Burger King, Starbucks, La Tagliatella, Blue Frog and Kabb.

HUMANA: Facing withdrawals from insurance exchanges by Humana, Aetna and others amid surging premiums, the Obama Administration is preparing a major push to enroll new participants in public online marketplaces under the Affordable Care Act. The administration is considering an ad campaign with testimonials from newly insured consumers, as well as direct appeals to young people hit by tax penalties for failing to enroll (New York Times).

Humana and Aetna logos 250 On Monday, Aetna blamed anticipated losses for the Hartford insurer’s decision to exit nearly 70% of the exchange markets it’s been serving; that pullout will come next year. The followed a similar announcement earlier this month from Humana, which said Continue reading “Pizza Hut adding 300-plus restaurants in Central Europe; Yum stock hits 52-week high; and White House in big new Obamacare push as Humana and Aetna flee exchanges” →

Latest Headlines June 15, 2016June 15, 2016

Details emerge in new 52-bed Kindred rehab hospital; Chipotle stock hits 3-year low, and Amazon’s got something unique for all 319 million Americans

A news summary, focused on 10 big employers; updated 4:24 p.m.

Palomar Medical Center — Palomar’s existing Escondido hospital; the new Kindred hospital will be built nearby.

KINDRED‘s just-announced 52-bed rehab hospital planned for southern California will be built by a private investment company, which will then lease it to the joint venture run by Kindred and local partner Palomar Health. Expected to open in 2019, the facility will be built on Palomar’s existing 56-acre campus in Escondido in San Diego County, 103 miles south of Los Angeles. Kindred didn’t detail the construction cost in its late-afternoon announcement yesterday. Escondido has just 149,000 residents, but the county ‘s total population is 3.1 million.

Palomar wants to relocate its existing inpatient rehabilitation program run by Kindred since 2000 at an older Palomar building in downtown Escondido. Palomar’s campus already includes an 11-story, 740,000-square-foot hospital opened in 2012; it has 288 private single-patient rooms, 44 emergency and trauma rooms, and 11 operating rooms (San Diego Union-Tribune). The new facility will be Kindred’s 20th rehab hospital nationwide. The Louisville company also has 95 transitional-care hospitals and 90 nursing centers. Palomar was launched in 1933 by two women — a nurse and a dietician — who used their own money to buy an egg and poultry plant downtown and converted it into a 13-bed hospital.

In Louisville, meanwhile, Kindred is planning a four-story, 114-room nursing home near the Old Brownsboro Crossing development at Chamberlain Lane. That follows the company’s disclosure two weeks ago that it’s closing its nursing and rehabilitation center near Bashford Manor, with 110 residents and 153 employees (Courier-Journal).

TACO BELL rival Chipotle’s once high-flying shares fell again, closing at $390.31 moments ago, the second consecutive day near three-year lows after a bearish Deutsche Bank report Monday. The stock’s weakness is the latest sign the Mexican food chain is still recovering from a devastating E. Coli outbreak last year; shares had reached an all-time high of $748 last August.

Analyst Brett Levy said Chipotle’s profit margin potential is now highly uncertain as sales continue to decline, and some customers “may be lost for good.” The analyst cut his price target to $340 (KDVR). The Denver-based chain was felled by two E. coli outbreaks starting in late October, forcing the company to shutter all its stores for a day to retrain employees. Chipotle shares have plunged 39% since the first outbreak emerged vs. a 17% gain by Taco Bell parent Yum. The CDC declared the outbreak over in February (CNBC). More about Yum.

AMAZON: A new report may have settled a long-standing question: How many different products does Amazon sell? Answer: 12.2 million on its own. Throw in marketplace sellers, and the number soars to nearly 354 million — enough to supply one different gift to each of the U.S.’s 319 million residents. Both figures exclude books, media, wine, and services, according to the 360pi study (Chain Store Age).

Kansas City, Kan., has emerged as a likely location for one of Amazon’s newest distribution centers, sparking speculation same-day delivery service won’t be far behind; it’s already available in Louisville and 26 other markets. The retailer is already working on a 822,104-square-foot center 37 miles southwest of Kansas City in Egerton, and plans to begin staffing there early next month for the busy third-quarter shipping season (Kansas City Business Journal). Amazon has two centers in the Louisville area with 6,000 employees, and another three elsewhere in Kentucky.

In other news, urban life blog Broken Sidewalk has new drawings of the recently announced six-story, 128-room Cambria Hotel proposed for the former Connection nightclub site on the corner of Market Street and Floyd Street in NuLu.

On Wall Street, U.S. stocks opened higher as traders eyed the end of a two-day Federal Reserve Open Market Committee meeting at 2 p.m. (Google Finance).

Latest Headlines June 8, 2016July 19, 2016

Taco rises, Chipotle plunges in new survey; Yum sets China spin for Oct. 31; Aetna: DOJ wants more info, but deal on track

A news summary, focused on big employers; updated 5:30 p.m.

Taco Bell store front — Taco revamped menu this year to include breakfast.

TACO BELL ranked No. 2 among fast-casual Mexican restaurants in the annual Harris Poll restaurant brand survey, published today, right behind Moe’s Southwest Grill. Last year, the Yum unit tied for No. 3. Meanwhile, Chipotle — hit hard this year by stubborn health scares at some restaurants — got knocked down to No. 5; it had topped the list the past three years (Harris). Moe’s is owned by the same company that operates shopping mall mainstays Auntie Anne’s and Cinnabon. (USA Today).

In horrific allegations in Houston, three teenagers say Taco Bell employees stabbed one of them, then burnt the other two with hot grease — accusations the company disputes (CW 33and Houston Chronicle). And in Wisconsin, a 25-year-old Village of Waterford man is facing the possibility of more than three years in prison after allegedly passing out in the drive-thru of a Waukesha Taco Bell last week and physically refusing arrest (Journal Times).

BROWN-FORMAN said Michael McShane, a senior vice president overseeing the Australia, New Zealand, and Southeast Asia regions, is retiring Oct. 31. The spirits and wine giant didn’t disclose details about replacing him. McShane’s 17-year career started in 1999 as finance director for Brown-Forman Beverages based in Sydney after serving in a variety of roles for Swift & Moore, then distributor for Brown-Forman in Australia (press release). Also, a transcript is now available for the company’s fourth-quarter earnings conference call yesterday (Seeking Alpha).

YUM has set Oct. 31 as the date it plans to formally split itself into two publicly traded companies when it cleaves the mammoth China division away under pressure from activist investor Corvex Management. CEO Greg Creed said yesterday his team would begin a road show in early October to pitch the split to prospective investors (The Street). Yum shares closed at $83.73, down less than 1%.

HUMANA: Aetna president Karen Lynch told analysts at a Goldman Sachs health care conference the Hartford insurer is giving the Justice Department “a lot of information” in response to a second request, amid the agency’s review of the planned $37 billion acquisition of Humana. But she didn’t detail the nature of the agency’s additional request. Lynch said the deal still remains on track to close later this year (Hartford Courant).

TEXAS ROADHOUSE shares closed at $46.54, up 15 cents, after hitting an intraday high of $46.81. It was the second consecutive day shares closed at an all-time high. The casual steak house chain’s stock has soared 27% in the past year vs. a slim 1% gain in the S&P 500 index (Google Finance). Since opening in 1993, the company has grown to more than 460 locations in 49 states and five international locations in the Middle East (company fact sheet).

GE will pay eligible workers a “closing payment” of $800 following the $5.6 billion sale of the company’s home appliances business to China’s Haier. Also, those who lose jobs within the first year after the sale will get preferential placement at other GE locations. The sale closed Monday, ending a 61-year chapter in Louisville’s economic history. The IUE-CWA union and Haier have agreed to honor terms of the current contract with about 6,000 Appliance Park workers while a new one is being negotiated (WDRB). Monday’s sale also included GE’s 1,200-employee refrigerator factory in Decatur, Ala. (Decatur Daily News). Haier and other Chinese multinationals setting up factories in the U.S. are attracted to America’s stable social, political, and legal environments. Haier completed its $5.6 billion acquisition of GE Appliances on Monday, part of a wave of such investments totaling more than $15 billion last year (Rutgers University).

UPS: Prosecutors in Las Vegas have dropped charges against a paraplegic man accused May 21 of robbing a UPS driver of a cellphone and scanner, and then running from the scene, conceding his disabilities would have made that impossible. But the prosecutor’s move didn’t come until after Antwine Hunter spent two weeks in jail (Review-Journal).

In other news, in a move with big implications for The Courier Journal, the top editor at USA Today, David Callaway, is leaving to become CEO of financial news site The Street, effective July 1; the paper has started a search for his replacement (USA Today).

Callaway had been at the paper four years, a period during which it assumed growing influence over the CJ Continue reading “Taco rises, Chipotle plunges in new survey; Yum sets China spin for Oct. 31; Aetna: DOJ wants more info, but deal on track” →

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