Your burrito may be getting a bit more expensive.
Chipotle Mexican Grill ( CMG ) is raising prices across the U.S., the company said Wednesday. “For the first time in over a year, we have taken a modest price increase of approximately 2% nationally to offset inflation,” Chipotle Chief Corporate Affairs Officer Laurie Schalow said in an email to Investopedia .
New Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Scott Boatwright , elevated to the top job last month, on the company’s most-recent earnings conference call in October said there was “nothing planned today, but that's not to say we wouldn't look at a pricing action at some point in the future.” A Wall Street Journal article last week alluded to the possibility of higher prices at Chipotle.
Shares of Chipotle were recently up more than 4%, leaving them almost 40% higher this year so far.
“The menu price increase is earlier than we … expected” and “a positive for the stock, in our view,” Truist Securities analysts wrote Wednesday. “We believe CMG is taking the menu price from a point of strength.” The analysts edged their price target on the shares up $2 to $74, a bit above Wall Street’s average of $68 per Visible Alpha data.
Wednesday afternoon, the stock was changing hands a bit below $64.
The effects of the menu price increases would likely be seen in the company’s fourth-quarter financial results, set for release in early February.
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