Investors are getting their appetite back for restaurant stocks as they smell the early signs of consumers picking up menus and dining out again.
Optimism that restaurants will keep filling their tables has boosted shares of Chipotle, DineEquity and BJ’s Restaurants 141%, 89% and 87% this year, far outdistancing the 6% rise in the Standard & Poor’s 500. Other large food chains are seeing big jumps in their stocks, too, with McDonald’s and Starbucks at the highest prices in more than a year.