Retail investors in Cipher Mining Inc. (NASDAQ:CIFR) are its biggest bettors, and their bets paid off as stock gained 27% last week
Key Insights
Significant control over Cipher Mining by retail investors implies that the general public has more power to influence management and governance-related decisions
50% of the business is held by the top 13 shareholders
If you want to know who really controls Cipher Mining Inc. (NASDAQ:CIFR), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. And the group that holds the biggest piece of the pie are retail investors with 44% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.
Clearly, retail investors benefitted the most after the company's market cap rose by US$326m last week.
Let's take a closer look to see what the different types of shareholders can tell us about Cipher Mining.
See our latest analysis for Cipher Mining
What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Cipher Mining?
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 Cipher Mining does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. 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 Cipher Mining's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.
Cipher Mining is not owned by hedge funds. Bitfury Holding B.V. is currently the largest shareholder, with 24% of shares outstanding. Valery Vavilov is the second largest shareholder owning 17% of common stock, and Rodney Page holds about 1.4% of the company stock. Rodney Page, who is the third-largest shareholder, also happens to hold the title of Member of the Board of Directors.
After doing some more digging, we found that the top 13 have the combined ownership of 50% in the company, suggesting that no single shareholder has significant control over the company.
While studying institutional ownership for a company can add value to your research, it is also a good practice to research analyst recommendations to get a deeper understand of a stock's expected performance. Quite a few analysts cover the stock, so you could look into forecast growth quite easily.
Insider Ownership Of Cipher Mining
While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. Company management run the business, but the CEO will answer to the board, even if he or she is a member of it.
I generally consider insider ownership to be a good thing. However, on some occasions it makes it more difficult for other shareholders to hold the board accountable for decisions.
Our most recent data indicates that insiders own a reasonable proportion of Cipher Mining Inc.. It is very interesting to see that insiders have a meaningful US$300m stake in this US$1.5b business. Most would be pleased to see the board is investing alongside them. You may wish to access this free chart showing recent trading by insiders.
General Public Ownership
The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 44% stake in Cipher Mining. 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 24%, of the company's shares. It's hard to draw any conclusions from this fact alone, so its worth looking into who owns those private companies. Sometimes insiders or other related parties have an interest in shares in a public company through a separate private company.
Next Steps:
It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Cipher Mining better, we need to consider many other factors. Be aware that Cipher Mining is showing 3 warning signs in our investment analysis , and 1 of those is a bit concerning...
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.
