Private companies among Grupo SBF S.A.'s (BVMF:SBFG3) largest shareholders, saw gain in holdings value after stock jumped 9.2% last week

Key Insights

• Grupo SBF's significant private companies ownership suggests that the key decisions are influenced by shareholders from the larger public
• 59% of the business is held by the top 2 shareholders
• Institutional ownership in Grupo SBF is 16%

If you want to know who really controls Grupo SBF S.A. (BVMF:SBFG3), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 59% to be precise, is private companies. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

As a result, private companies collectively scored the highest last week as the company hit R$2.9b market cap following a 9.2% gain in the stock.

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

See our latest analysis for Grupo SBF

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Grupo SBF?

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 Grupo SBF 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. 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 Grupo SBF's historic earnings and revenue below, but keep in mind there's always more to the story.

Grupo SBF is not owned by hedge funds. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is Pacipar Participacoes Ltda. with 39% of shares outstanding. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 20% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 2.3% by the third-largest shareholder.

After doing some more digging, we found that the top 2 shareholders collectively control more than half of the company's shares, implying that they have considerable power to influence the company's decisions.

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 Grupo SBF

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. Management ultimately answers to the board. However, it is not uncommon for managers to be executive board members, especially if they are a founder or the CEO.

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.

We note our data does not show any board members holding shares, personally. It is unusual not to have at least some personal holdings by board members, so our data might be flawed. A good next step would be to check how much the CEO is paid.

General Public Ownership

With a 25% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Grupo SBF. 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 59%, of the Grupo SBF 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.

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. Like risks, for instance. Every company has them, and we've spotted 3 warning signs for Grupo SBF (of which 2 are significant!) you should know about.

But ultimately it is the future, not the past, that will determine how well the owners of this business will do. Therefore we think it advisable to take a look at this free report showing whether analysts are predicting a brighter 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.