LOCO — El Pollo Loco Holdings Inc

Stock analysis, trade plans, and proprietary indicators by Trend Edge.

Trend Edge Setup Score

Trend Edge rates LOCO Bullish with a Setup Score of 40, net conviction 42, actionability 39. How the Setup Score works →

Total Setup Score40
Directional BiasBullish
Net Conviction42
Actionability39 (in range)

Key signals behind this score

About El Pollo Loco Holdings Inc

El Pollo Loco Holdings, Inc., through its subsidiary, El Pollo Loco, Inc., develops, franchises, licenses, and operates quick-service restaurants under the El Pollo Loco name. The company operates and franchises restaurants located in California, Nevada, Arizona, Texas, Colorado, Utah, Louisiana, New Mexico, and Washington. It also licenses its brand to restaurants in the Philippines. Read full Trend Edge analysis →

Trend Edge Proprietary Indicators

Key Metrics

Current Price$15.62
Market Cap$468M
Float25.6M
Shares Outstanding30.5M
P/E (Forward)14.03
P/E (TTM)13.14
Price/Sales (TTM)0.93
vs. Analyst Target+30.0% to analyst PT
Profit Margin6.96%
Operating Margin (TTM)9.94%
Revenue (TTM)$501M
Earnings Growth (YoY)79.20%
Dividend RateNone
Analyst Target Price$20.30 (5 analysts)

Financial History

Annual Revenue & Earnings History

YearRevenueNet IncomeGross ProfitEBITDA
2020 $426M $24.5M $93.7M $50.3M
2021 $454M $29.1M $99.3M $56.5M
2022 $470M $20.8M $83.7M $45.0M
2023 $469M $25.6M $93.4M $55.1M
2024 $473M $25.7M $104M $56.9M
2025 $490M $26.5M $140M $58.0M

Recent Quarterly Revenue & Net Income

QuarterRevenueNet Income
Sep 2025 $122M $7.4M
Dec 2025 $124M $6.5M
Mar 2026 $126M $8.2M
Jun 2026 $130M $12.8M

Ownership & Float

Insider Ownership2.5%
Institutional Ownership99.4%
Short Float6.4%
% of All Funds Holding1.71%
Number of Funds Holding150

Current Moving Averages

Trend Edge tracks near-term, medium-term, cyclical, and secular moving averages across weekly and monthly timeframes to identify trend structure at every horizon.

TimeframeSMAValueTrend Context
Weekly10-Week SMA$16.15Near-term / short-term trend
Weekly40-Week SMA$13.40Medium-term trend
Weekly80-Week SMA$11.81Cyclical trend (business cycle)
Weekly200-Week SMA$11.02Secular trend (multi-year)
Monthly10-Month SMA$13.38Near-term monthly trend
Monthly20-Month SMA$11.95Medium-term monthly trend
Monthly40-Month SMA$11.15Secular monthly trend

Volume Shelves — Support & Resistance

Trend Edge identifies volume shelves: price zones where historically elevated trading volume creates structural support or resistance. A volume shelf forms when a disproportionate share of cumulative volume was transacted at a specific price level, making it a high-conviction anchor for future price reactions.

Price LevelTypeVolume RatioAge
$14.80 support 1.23x 1 months ago
$13.60 support 1.40x 2 months ago
$11.10 support 1.67x 4 months ago
$9.40 support 1.27x 14 months ago

Historical Earnings Reactions (49 events)

TimeframeAvg ReturnMedianWin RateBestWorst
Gap 1.88% 0.35% 57.14% 26.40% -14.11%
1 Day 1.69% 0.80% 57.14% 29.09% -19.77%
1 Week 1.14% -0.52% 42.86% 30.06% -22.47%
2 Weeks 0.69% 0.92% 53.06% 28.26% -33.56%
1 Month 2.59% 0.29% 52.08% 44.35% -38.15%

Next earnings: October 25, 2026 (58 days away)

Seasonality & Day-of-Week Patterns

Monthly Seasonality

MonthAvg ReturnWin RateSamples
Jan5.1%66.7%12
Feb-2.2%25.0%12
Mar-5.7%33.3%12
Apr2.0%41.7%12
May1.4%50.0%12
Jun4.8%75.0%12
Jul2.7%50.0%12
Aug-5.1%41.7%12
Sep-2.3%33.3%12
Oct-1.9%33.3%12
Nov4.6%66.7%12
Dec-2.3%33.3%12

Day-of-Week Tendencies

DayAvg ReturnWin RateSamples
Monday -0.04% 46.8% 570
Tuesday -0.02% 47.6% 626
Wednesday 0.08% 49.0% 623
Thursday 0.01% 46.4% 610
Friday 0.09% 48.0% 608

Top Institutional Holders

Institutional holder breakdown coming soon.

Total institutional ownership: 99.4%

Insider Transactions — Smart Summary

Total insider ownership: 2.5%

12-Month Insider Activity Summary

Total Filings7
Net Value+N/A
Net Shares Change-427,350
% of Float-1.7%
C-Suite Filings0
Clusters Detected0

Key Insiders

NameTitleNet ValueFilingsActivity
BIGLARI, SARDAR -$7.2M 7 7 sell

Significant Filings

DateInsiderTitleNet ValuePrice After
2026-08-05 BIGLARI, SARDAR -$1.7M Transaction at $16.87, now -7.4%
2026-08-11 BIGLARI, SARDAR -$18,766 Transaction at $17.06, now -8.4%
2026-07-31 BIGLARI, SARDAR -$119,587.744 Transaction at $16.71, now -6.5%
2026-06-30 BIGLARI, SARDAR -$3.7M Transaction at $16.69, now -6.4%
2026-07-14 BIGLARI, SARDAR -$1.3M Transaction at $16.74, now -6.7%
2026-07-21 BIGLARI, SARDAR -$183,810 Transaction at $16.71, now -6.5%

View full insider transaction history on Trend Edge →

AI Consult Analysis

Trend Edge's AI Consult feature delivers a comprehensive, multi-layer trade plan for El Pollo Loco Holdings Inc (LOCO) powered by Claude Opus — Anthropic's most capable AI model. The analysis covers five layers: technical analysis (near-term, medium-term, cyclical, and secular trend, momentum, volume shelf support and resistance, breakout and breakdown signals), qualitative analysis (business model, competitive moat, sector dynamics), insider sentiment (buy and sell signals from executive and director transactions), share stats analysis (institutional accumulation, fund positioning, short float squeeze potential), and fundamental analysis (valuation, revenue growth, profit margin, earnings quality).

AI Consult synthesizes all five layers into a single bullish or bearish thesis with explicit entry, exit, stop loss, and take profit levels — giving you a complete, AI-powered trade plan with defined risk/reward. Whether you are building a long position, initiating a short, or looking for a reversal setup, AI Consult identifies the highest-probability signal from the current trend.

Get the full AI Consult analysis for LOCO on Trend Edge →