Hulic Co., Ltd.'s (TSE:3003) large institutional owners must be happy as stock continues to impress, up 4.0% over the past week

Key Insights

• Significantly high institutional ownership implies Hulic's stock price is sensitive to their trading actions
• A total of 13 investors have a majority stake in the company with 50% ownership
• Ownership research along with analyst forecasts data help provide a good understanding of opportunities in a stock

To get a sense of who is truly in control of Hulic Co., Ltd. (TSE:3003), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. And the group that holds the biggest piece of the pie are institutions with 42% ownership. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

And as as result, institutional investors reaped the most rewards after the company's stock price gained 4.0% last week. The one-year return on investment is currently 19% and last week's gain would have been more than welcomed.

Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of Hulic, beginning with the chart below.

Check out our latest analysis for Hulic

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Hulic?

Institutions typically measure themselves against a benchmark when reporting to their own investors, so they often become more enthusiastic about a stock once it's included in a major index. We would expect most companies to have some institutions on the register, especially if they are growing.

We can see that Hulic 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. 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 Hulic, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

Hedge funds don't have many shares in Hulic. The company's largest shareholder is Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Company, Asset Management Arm, with ownership of 6.3%. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 5.5% and 5.4% of the stock.

A closer look at our ownership figures suggests that the top 13 shareholders have a combined ownership of 50% implying that no single shareholder has a majority.

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. Quite a few analysts cover the stock, so you could look into forecast growth quite easily.

Insider Ownership Of Hulic

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.

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.

Our most recent data indicates that insiders own less than 1% of Hulic Co., Ltd.. But they may have an indirect interest through a corporate structure that we haven't picked up on. It's a big company, so even a small proportional interest can create alignment between the board and shareholders. In this case insiders own JP¥2.0b worth of shares. Arguably, recent buying and selling is just as important to consider. You can click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 40% stake in Hulic. While this size of ownership may not be enough to sway a policy decision in their favour, they can still make a collective impact on company policies.

Private Company Ownership

It seems that Private Companies own 4.0%, of the Hulic stock. 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.

Public Company Ownership

It appears to us that public companies own 14% of Hulic. 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:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Hulic better, we need to consider many other factors. Be aware that Hulic is showing 2 warning signs in our investment analysis , and 1 of those is a bit unpleasant...

If you would prefer discover what analysts are predicting in terms of future growth, do not miss this free report on analyst forecasts.

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.