Papa John’s Int’l, Inc. (NASDAQ:PZZA) wiped out all the gains made in the previous 4-5 days as it ended the last trading session with a loss of 1.88%. This also indicates the quality of the last corrective bounce which came in the form of a series of narrow range days. The volume of the day at 306,000 was not much lower than the daily average of 370,000 though none of the figures were that significant. The price action in the last few days increased the probability of an imminent breakdown and the Cup & Handle top seen on the chart would be encouraging for the bears.
Papa John’s Int’l, Inc. (NASDAQ:PZZA) has announced that it would pay a total of $500,000 in back wages to around 250 of its workers. The back wages are part of a settlement reached, after an investigation by the US Department of Labor. A total of four franchises from the food chain were named in the filing, out of which three are current and one is a former franchise. As per the result of the investigation, the franchises admitted to violating the rules of minimum wages and overtime, apart from a few other breaches of labor laws.
Furthermore, a number of institutional investors have been losing faith in PZZA and have been actively selling the stock. The institutional sentiment is said to have declined from 1.04 in 1Q2015 to 0.79 in 2Q2015. Analysts have also been weighing in on the ticker and expect it to report an EPS of $0.45, for its 3Q2015. This figure would be up by 15.38% from the preceding year. However, as compared to the last quarter, the earnings are expected to decline by $0.02. Even the analysts at WallStreet believe that the stock is moving towards a negative EPS growth of 4.26%.
Currently, the largest portfolio in the company is held by Atlas Browninc, 5.42%. Additionally, if insider buying and selling is anything to go by, then the picture for PZZA still seems very bleak. Since March 9, 2015, the stock has seen a total of 0 insider buying transactions and 10 selling transactions. The sales have been worth $34.13 million in total. As far as the international analysts are concerned, they have weighed in positively for the stock and expect it to bounce back anytime soon. Currently, Papa John’s outlook to the public is not very positive, but the company is trying to make efforts to change that.
Papa John’s Int’l, Inc. (NASDAQ:PZZA) closed at a share price of $66.93, after trading a total volume of 306,901 shares, and reporting a decline of 1.88% during the October 21 session.
