Yahoo Finance Retail investors among Clariant AG's (VTX:CLN) largest shareholders, saw gain in holdings value after stock jumped 5.4% last week
Key Insights
The considerable ownership by retail investors in Clariant indicates that they collectively have a greater say in management and business strategy
51% of the business is held by the top 10 shareholders
A look at the shareholders of Clariant AG (VTX:CLN) can tell us which group is most powerful. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 42% to be precise, is retail investors. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).
Clearly, retail investors benefitted the most after the company's market cap rose by CHF224m last week.
Let's take a closer look to see what the different types of shareholders can tell us about Clariant.
Check out our latest analysis for Clariant
What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Clariant?
Institutional investors commonly compare their own returns to the returns of a commonly followed index. So they generally do consider buying larger companies that are included in the relevant benchmark index.
Clariant already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in the company. This can indicate that the company has a certain degree of credibility in the investment community. However, it is best to be wary of relying on the supposed validation that comes with institutional investors. They too, get it wrong sometimes. It is not uncommon to see a big share price drop if two large institutional investors try to sell out of a stock at the same time. So it is worth checking the past earnings trajectory of Clariant, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.
Hedge funds don't have many shares in Clariant. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is Saudi Arabian Oil Company with 32% of shares outstanding. With 3.9% and 3.5% of the shares outstanding respectively, BlackRock, Inc. and Blue Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH are the second and third largest shareholders.
On further inspection, we found that more than half the company's shares are owned by the top 10 shareholders, suggesting that the interests of the larger shareholders are balanced out to an extent by the smaller ones.
Researching institutional ownership is a good way to gauge and filter a stock's expected performance. The same can be achieved by studying analyst sentiments. There are a reasonable number of analysts covering the stock, so it might be useful to find out their aggregate view on the future.
Insider Ownership Of Clariant
While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. The company management answer to the board and the latter should represent the interests of shareholders. Notably, sometimes top-level managers are on the board themselves.
Most consider insider ownership a positive because it can indicate the board is well aligned with other shareholders. However, on some occasions too much power is concentrated within this group.
Shareholders would probably be interested to learn that insiders own shares in Clariant AG. It is a pretty big company, so it is generally a positive to see some potentially meaningful alignment. In this case, they own around CHF106m worth of shares (at current prices). Most would say this shows alignment of interests between shareholders and the board. Still, it might be worth checking if those insiders have been selling.
General Public Ownership
The general public-- including retail investors -- own 42% stake in the company, and hence can't easily be ignored. While this group can't necessarily call the shots, it can certainly have a real influence on how the company is run.
Private Company Ownership
Our data indicates that Private Companies hold 3.5%, of the company's shares. It might be worth looking deeper into this. If related parties, such as insiders, have an interest in one of these private companies, that should be disclosed in the annual report. Private companies may also have a strategic interest in the company.
Public Company Ownership
We can see that public companies hold 32% of the Clariant shares on issue. This may be a strategic interest and the two companies may have related business interests. It could be that they have de-merged. This holding is probably worth investigating further.
Next Steps:
I find it very interesting to look at who exactly owns a company. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too. For instance, we've identified 1 warning sign for Clariant that you should be aware of.
But ultimately it is the future, not the past, that will determine how well the owners of this business will do. Therefore we think it advisable to take a look at this free report showing whether analysts are predicting a brighter future.
NB: Figures in this article are calculated using data from the last twelve months, which refer to the 12-month period ending on the last date of the month the financial statement is dated. This may not be consistent with full year annual report figures.
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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.
