Delivery Hero SE (ETR:DHER) is favoured by institutional owners who hold 38% of the company

Key Insights

• Institutions' substantial holdings in Delivery Hero implies that they have significant influence over the company's share price
• A total of 6 investors have a majority stake in the company with 53% ownership
• Using data from analyst forecasts alongside ownership research, one can better assess the future performance of a company

A look at the shareholders of Delivery Hero SE (ETR:DHER) can tell us which group is most powerful. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 38% to be precise, is institutions. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

Given the vast amount of money and research capacities at their disposal, institutional ownership tends to carry a lot of weight, especially with individual investors. Therefore, a good portion of institutional money invested in the company is usually a huge vote of confidence on its future.

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

See our latest analysis for Delivery Hero

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Delivery Hero?

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 Delivery Hero. 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. 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 Delivery Hero, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

Our data indicates that hedge funds own 5.0% of Delivery Hero. That catches my attention because hedge funds sometimes try to influence management, or bring about changes that will create near term value for shareholders. The company's largest shareholder is Naspers Limited, with ownership of 27%. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 7.2% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 5.2% by the third-largest shareholder.

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. 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 Delivery Hero

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.

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 data cannot confirm that board members are holding shares personally. Given we are not picking up on insider ownership, we may have missing data. Therefore, it would be interesting to assess the CEO compensation and tenure, here.

General Public Ownership

With a 26% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Delivery Hero. While this group can't necessarily call the shots, it can certainly have a real influence on how the company is run.

Private Company Ownership

We can see that Private Companies own 3.5%, of the shares on issue. Private companies may be related parties. Sometimes insiders have an interest in a public company through a holding in a private company, rather than in their own capacity as an individual. While it's hard to draw any broad stroke conclusions, it is worth noting as an area for further research.

Public Company Ownership

We can see that public companies hold 27% of the Delivery Hero shares on issue. It's hard to say for sure but this suggests they have entwined business interests. This might be a strategic stake, so it's worth watching this space for changes in ownership.

Next Steps:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. To that end, you should be aware of the 2 warning signs we've spotted with Delivery Hero .

Ultimately the future is most important. You can access this free report on analyst forecasts for the company.

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.