With 31% stake, SolGold Plc (LON:SOLG) seems to have captured institutional investors' interest
Key Insights
Institutions' substantial holdings in SolGold implies that they have significant influence over the company's share price
A total of 9 investors have a majority stake in the company with 52% ownership
Ownership research, combined with past performance data can help provide a good understanding of opportunities in a stock
If you want to know who really controls SolGold Plc (LON:SOLG), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. We can see that institutions own the lion's share in the company with 31% ownership. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).
Given the vast amount of money and research capacities at their disposal, institutional ownership tends to carry a lot of weight, especially with individual investors. Therefore, a good portion of institutional money invested in the company is usually a huge vote of confidence on its future.
Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of SolGold, beginning with the chart below.
See our latest analysis for SolGold
What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About SolGold?
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.
We can see that SolGold does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This implies the analysts working for those institutions have looked at the stock and they like it. But just like anyone else, they could be wrong. If multiple institutions change their view on a stock at the same time, you could see the share price drop fast. It's therefore worth looking at SolGold's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.
SolGold is not owned by hedge funds. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is BHP Billiton Holdings Limited with 10% of shares outstanding. Meanwhile, the second and third largest shareholders, hold 10% and 6.8%, of the shares outstanding, respectively.
On further inspection, we found that more than half the company's shares are owned by the top 9 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 is a little analyst coverage of the stock, but not much. So there is room for it to gain more coverage.
Insider Ownership Of SolGold
The definition of company insiders can be subjective and does vary between jurisdictions. Our data reflects individual insiders, capturing board members at the very least. Company management run the business, but the CEO will answer to the board, even if he or she is a member of it.
Insider ownership is positive when it signals leadership are thinking like the true owners of the company. However, high insider ownership can also give immense power to a small group within the company. This can be negative in some circumstances.
Our most recent data indicates that insiders own some shares in SolGold Plc. It has a market capitalization of just UK£504m, and insiders have UK£13m worth of shares, in their own names. It is good to see some investment by insiders, but it might be worth checking if those insiders have been buying.
General Public Ownership
The general public-- including retail investors -- own 23% 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
It seems that Private Companies own 21%, of the SolGold stock. 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
It appears to us that public companies own 22% of SolGold. We can't be certain but it is quite possible this is a strategic stake. The businesses may be similar, or work together.
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. Case in point: We've spotted 4 warning signs for SolGold you should be aware of, and 2 of them make us uncomfortable.
If you are like me, you may want to think about whether this company will grow or shrink. Luckily, you can check this free report showing analyst forecasts for its 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.
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