What Kind Of Shareholder Owns Most Wildflower Brands Inc. (CSE:SUN) Stock?

Every investor in Wildflower Brands Inc. (CSE:SUN) should be aware of the most powerful shareholder groups. Institutions often own shares in more established companies, while it's not unusual to see insiders own a fair bit of smaller companies. I generally like to see some degree of insider ownership, even if only a little. As Nassim Nicholas Taleb said, 'Don’t tell me what you think, tell me what you have in your portfolio.

Wildflower Brands is a smaller company with a market capitalization of CA$26m, so it may still be flying under the radar of many institutional investors. In the chart below, we can see that institutions don't own many shares in the company. We can zoom in on the different ownership groups, to learn more about Wildflower Brands.

View our latest analysis for Wildflower Brands

What Does The Lack Of Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Wildflower Brands?

Small companies that are not very actively traded often lack institutional investors, but it's less common to see large companies without them.

There are many reasons why a company might not have any institutions on the share registry. It may be hard for institutions to buy large amounts of shares, if liquidity (the amount of shares traded each day) is low. If the company has not needed to raise capital, institutions might lack the opportunity to build a position. On the other hand, it's always possible that professional investors are avoiding a company because they don't think it's the best place for their money. Institutional investors may not find the historic growth of the business impressive, or there might be other factors at play. You can see the past revenue performance of Wildflower Brands, for yourself, below.

Hedge funds don't have many shares in Wildflower Brands. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is the CEO William MacLean with 17% of shares outstanding. The second and third largest shareholders are Krystian Wetulani and Stephen Pearce, each holding around 8.3% of the shares outstanding. They also hold the titles of Senior Key Executive and Member of the Board of Directors, respectively. This once again signifies considerable insider ownership amongst the company's top shareholders.

On studying our ownership data, we found that 7 of the top shareholders collectively own less than 50% of the share register, implying that no single individual has a majority interest.

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. We're not picking up on any analyst coverage of the stock at the moment, so the company is unlikely to be widely held.

Insider Ownership Of Wildflower Brands

The definition of an insider can differ slightly between different countries, but members of the board of directors always count. The company management answer to the board; and the latter should represent the interests of shareholders. Notably, sometimes top-level managers are on the board, themselves.

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.

It seems insiders own a significant proportion of Wildflower Brands Inc.. It has a market capitalization of just CA$26m, and insiders have CA$9.9m worth of shares in their own names. It is great to see insiders so invested in the business. It might be worth checking if those insiders have been buying recently.

General Public Ownership

The general public, who are mostly retail investors, collectively hold 61% of Wildflower Brands shares. This level of ownership gives retail investors the power to sway key policy decisions such as board composition, executive compensation, and the dividend payout ratio.

Next Steps:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. Case in point: We've spotted 4 warning signs for Wildflower Brands you should be aware of, and 2 of them are a bit concerning.

Of course this may not be the best stock to buy. Therefore, you may wish to see our free collection of interesting prospects boasting favorable financials.

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. 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. Thank you for reading.