Knaus Tabbert AG's (ETR:KTA) market cap surged €49m last week, private equity firms who have a lot riding on the company were rewarded

Key Insights

• Knaus Tabbert's significant private equity firms ownership suggests that the key decisions are influenced by shareholders from the larger public
• A total of 2 investors have a majority stake in the company with 66% ownership
• 14% of Knaus Tabbert is held by Institutions

If you want to know who really controls Knaus Tabbert AG (ETR:KTA), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. We can see that private equity firms own the lion's share in the company with 41% 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, private equity firms were the biggest beneficiaries of last week’s 12% gain.

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

See our latest analysis for Knaus Tabbert

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Knaus Tabbert?

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 Knaus Tabbert does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This can indicate that the company has a certain degree of credibility in the investment community. However, it is best to be wary of relying on the supposed validation that comes with institutional investors. They too, get it wrong sometimes. It is not uncommon to see a big share price drop if two large institutional investors try to sell out of a stock at the same time. So it is worth checking the past earnings trajectory of Knaus Tabbert, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Knaus Tabbert. Our data shows that HTP Investments B.V. is the largest shareholder with 41% of shares outstanding. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 25% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 4.9% by the third-largest shareholder.

To make our study more interesting, we found that the top 2 shareholders have a majority ownership in the company, meaning that they are powerful enough to influence the decisions of 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. Quite a few analysts cover the stock, so you could look into forecast growth quite easily.

Insider Ownership Of Knaus Tabbert

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.

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.

Our data cannot confirm that board members are 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 21% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Knaus Tabbert. 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 Equity Ownership

With an ownership of 41%, private equity firms are in a position to play a role in shaping corporate strategy with a focus on value creation. Some might like this, because private equity are sometimes activists who hold management accountable. But other times, private equity is selling out, having taking the company public.

Private Company Ownership

It seems that Private Companies own 25%, of the Knaus Tabbert 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 Knaus Tabbert (of which 1 makes us a bit uncomfortable!) 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.