Individual investors in Filo Corp. (TSE:FIL) are its biggest bettors, and their bets paid off as stock gained 4.9% last week

Key Insights

• Significant control over Filo by individual investors implies that the general public has more power to influence management and governance-related decisions
• 48% of the business is held by the top 25 shareholders
• Insiders have been selling lately

If you want to know who really controls Filo Corp. (TSE:FIL), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. We can see that individual investors own the lion's share in the company with 51% ownership. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

As a result, individual investors were the biggest beneficiaries of last week’s 4.9% gain.

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

See our latest analysis for Filo

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Filo?

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.

As you can see, institutional investors have a fair amount of stake in Filo. This implies the analysts working for those institutions have looked at the stock and they like it. But just like anyone else, they could be wrong. 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 Filo's historic earnings and revenue below, but keep in mind there's always more to the story.

We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Filo. Zebra Holdings And Investments S.à R.L. is currently the company's largest shareholder with 21% of shares outstanding. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 6.3% and 3.0% of the stock.

On studying our ownership data, we found that 25 of the top shareholders collectively own less than 50% of the share register, implying that no single individual has a majority interest.

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. There are a reasonable number of analysts covering the stock, so it might be useful to find out their aggregate view on the future.

Insider Ownership Of Filo

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.

We can see that insiders own shares in Filo Corp.. This is a big company, so it is good to see this level of alignment. Insiders own CA$62m worth of shares (at current prices). 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, mostly comprising of individual investors, collectively holds 51% of Filo shares. This level of ownership gives investors from the wider public some power to sway key policy decisions such as board composition, executive compensation, and the dividend payout ratio.

Private Company Ownership

Our data indicates that Private Companies hold 30%, of the company's shares. 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:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. For instance, we've identified 5 warning signs for Filo (2 are potentially serious) that you should be aware of.

If you are like me, you may want to think about whether this company will grow or shrink. Luckily, you can check this free report showing analyst forecasts for its 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.