Following a 5.0% decline over last year, recent gains may please Bellevue Gold Limited (ASX:BGL) institutional owners

Key Insights

• Significantly high institutional ownership implies Bellevue Gold's stock price is sensitive to their trading actions
• The top 11 shareholders own 50% of the company
• Recent purchases by insiders

To get a sense of who is truly in control of Bellevue Gold Limited (ASX:BGL), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. We can see that institutions own the lion's share in the company with 59% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

After a year of 5.0% losses, last week’s 6.5% gain would be welcomed by institutional investors as a possible sign that returns might start trending higher.

Let's take a closer look to see what the different types of shareholders can tell us about Bellevue Gold.

Check out our latest analysis for Bellevue Gold

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Bellevue Gold?

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.

Bellevue Gold already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in the company. 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. When multiple institutions own a stock, there's always a risk that they are in a 'crowded trade'. When such a trade goes wrong, multiple parties may compete to sell stock fast. This risk is higher in a company without a history of growth. You can see Bellevue Gold's historic earnings and revenue below, but keep in mind there's always more to the story.

Investors should note that institutions actually own more than half the company, so they can collectively wield significant power. We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Bellevue Gold. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is BlackRock, Inc. with 12% of shares outstanding. With 9.0% and 5.8% of the shares outstanding respectively, Van Eck Associates Corporation and State Street Global Advisors, Inc. are the second and third largest shareholders.

After doing some more digging, we found that the top 11 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. There are plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too.

Insider Ownership Of Bellevue Gold

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.

We can report that insiders do own shares in Bellevue Gold Limited. The insiders have a meaningful stake worth AU$55m. Most would see this as a real positive. If you would like to explore the question of insider alignment, you can click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public-- including retail investors -- own 35% stake in the company, and hence can't easily be ignored. 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.

Next Steps:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Bellevue Gold better, we need to consider many other factors. Like risks, for instance. Every company has them, and we've spotted 2 warning signs for Bellevue Gold (of which 1 is significant!) 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.

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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.