With 60% ownership, Trend Micro Incorporated (TSE:4704) boasts of strong institutional backing

Simply Wall St · 07/02 00:47

Key Insights

  • Given the large stake in the stock by institutions, Trend Micro's stock price might be vulnerable to their trading decisions
  • A total of 10 investors have a majority stake in the company with 51% ownership
  • Ownership research along with analyst forecasts data help provide a good understanding of opportunities in a stock

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To get a sense of who is truly in control of Trend Micro Incorporated (TSE:4704), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 60% to be precise, is institutions. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

Since institutional have access to huge amounts of capital, their market moves tend to receive a lot of scrutiny by retail or 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 Trend Micro, beginning with the chart below.

Check out our latest analysis for Trend Micro

ownership-breakdown
TSE:4704 Ownership Breakdown July 2nd 2025

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Trend Micro?

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.

Trend Micro 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. 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 Trend Micro's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

earnings-and-revenue-growth
TSE:4704 Earnings and Revenue Growth July 2nd 2025

Since institutional investors own more than half the issued stock, the board will likely have to pay attention to their preferences. It looks like hedge funds own 7.2% of Trend Micro shares. That catches my attention because hedge funds sometimes try to influence management, or bring about changes that will create near term value for shareholders. The company's largest shareholder is Nomura Asset Management Co., Ltd., with ownership of 10%. Meanwhile, the second and third largest shareholders, hold 8.5% and 7.2%, of the shares outstanding, respectively. In addition, we found that Eva Chen, the CEO has 1.1% of the shares allocated to their name.

We also observed that the top 10 shareholders account for more than half of the share register, with a few smaller shareholders to balance the interests of the larger ones to a certain extent.

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 Trend Micro

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.

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.

We can see that insiders own shares in Trend Micro Incorporated. It is a very large company, and board members collectively own JP¥68b worth of shares (at current prices). Most would say this shows a good alignment of interests between shareholders and the board. Still, it might be worth checking if those insiders have been selling.

General Public Ownership

With a 28% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Trend Micro. This size of ownership, while considerable, may not be enough to change company policy if the decision is not in sync with other large shareholders.

Next Steps:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. Be aware that Trend Micro is showing 1 warning sign in our investment analysis , you should know about...

Ultimately the future is most important. You can access this free report on analyst forecasts for the company.

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.