Retail investors account for 38% of Vontobel Holding AG's (VTX:VONN) ownership, while institutions account for 37%

Key Insights

• Significant control over Vontobel Holding by retail investors implies that the general public has more power to influence management and governance-related decisions
• 52% of the business is held by the top 6 shareholders
• Institutional ownership in Vontobel Holding is 37%

If you want to know who really controls Vontobel Holding AG (VTX:VONN), 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 38% to be precise, is retail investors. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

Institutions, on the other hand, account for 37% of the company's stockholders. Generally speaking, as a company grows, institutions will increase their ownership. Conversely, insiders often decrease their ownership over time.

Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of Vontobel Holding, beginning with the chart below.

Check out our latest analysis for Vontobel Holding

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Vontobel Holding?

Many institutions measure their performance against an index that approximates the local market. So they usually pay more attention to companies that are included in major indices.

We can see that Vontobel Holding does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. 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. 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 Vontobel Holding's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Vontobel Holding is not owned by hedge funds. Our data shows that Vontobel Foundation, Endowment Arm is the largest shareholder with 15% of shares outstanding. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 15% and 11% of the stock.

On further inspection, we found that more than half the company's shares are owned by the top 6 shareholders, suggesting that the interests of the larger shareholders are balanced out to an extent by the smaller ones.

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. Quite a few analysts cover the stock, so you could look into forecast growth quite easily.

Insider Ownership Of Vontobel Holding

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.

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.

Our information suggests that Vontobel Holding AG insiders own under 1% of the company. But they may have an indirect interest through a corporate structure that we haven't picked up on. Keep in mind that it's a big company, and the insiders own CHF16m worth of shares. The absolute value might be more important than the proportional share. It is always good to see at least some insider ownership, but it might be worth checking if those insiders have been selling.

General Public Ownership

With a 38% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Vontobel Holding. 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.

Private Company Ownership

We can see that Private Companies own 25%, of the shares on issue. 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:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Vontobel Holding better, we need to consider many other factors. For instance, we've identified 1 warning sign for Vontobel Holding that you should be aware of.

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.