Why Darden Restaurants, Zimmer Biomet Holdings, and Applied Optoelectronics Jumped Today

Tuesday was a fairly quiet day on Wall Street, with major benchmarks largely pausing after huge gains in recent sessions. The tax reform package took a key step toward becoming law, with an afternoon vote in the House of Representatives passing the compromise measure and sending it to the Senate for its approval. Even though the overall market didn't see a huge upward move following the passage of the bill, a few stocks posted substantial gains following good news. Darden Restaurants (NYSE: DRI), Zimmer Biomet Holdings (NYSE: ZBH), and Applied Optoelectronics (NASDAQ: AAOI) were among the best performers on the day. Below, we'll look more closely at these stocks to tell you why they did so well.

Shares of Darden Restaurants climbed 7% after the company announced favorable financial results in its fiscal second-quarter report. The parent company of Olive Garden said that total revenue was up almost 15% from the year-earlier period, bolstered largely by the acquisition of Cheddar's Scratch Kitchen earlier this year. Same-restaurant sales were attractive for most of the company's key franchises, including a 3% rise in comps for Olive Garden, 3.8% for LongHorn Steakhouse and Capital Grille, and 6.8% for Eddie V's. Darden also boosted its outlook for fiscal 2018, expecting same-restaurant sales growth of 2% and slightly higher adjusted earnings than it had previously predicted. After a long malaise, it looks like the restaurant industry is bouncing back, and Darden's results show how it could benefit in 2018 and beyond.

Image source: Darden Restaurants.

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Source: Fool.com