Restaurant Winners: Burger King

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Stocks in the restaurant sector heated up on Thursday as private-equity buyout speculations circled a roster of fast-food chains.

Shares of Burger King Holdings(BKC) easily outpaced the sector, rocketing 24% on nearly 40 times average trading volume. Burger King announced it had agreed to be taken private by buyout firm 3G Capital for $4 billion.

>>Burger King Agrees to Buyout

A slew of restaurant-chain operators saw their shares rise on speculation that another private-equity takeover awaits the sector. Sonic(SONC) shares traded as high as $8.20 Thursday morning before falling back in the afternoon to $7.99, up 1% on the day.

Wendy's Arby's Group(WEN) jumped 6.6%, Jack in the Box(JACK) 3.8%, California Pizza Kitchen(CPKI) 4.8% and Chili's operator Brinker International(EAT) 6.5%.

"The right private owner might help one or more of these chains eventually become better, and likely smaller, competitors to [McDonald's]," UBS analysts wrote in a note to investors.

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Even stocks unaffiliated with buyout rumors enjoyed material share price gains Thursday. DineEquity(DIN), the operator of IHOP and Applebee's restaurants, added 7.8%, while shares of Biglari Holdings(BH), a holding company that recently more than doubled quarterly profits thanks to a stronger performance at its Steak n Shake restaurants and to its acquisition of Western Sizzlin, jumped 6%.