What You Need To Know About Carlsberg A/S' (CPH:CARL B) Investor Composition

A look at the shareholders of Carlsberg A/S (CPH:CARL B) can tell us which group is most powerful. Large companies usually have institutions as shareholders, and we usually see insiders owning shares in smaller companies. Companies that used to be publicly owned tend to have lower insider ownership.

With a market capitalization of kr.143b, Carlsberg is rather large. We'd expect to see institutional investors on the register. Companies of this size are usually well known to retail investors, too. Our analysis of the ownership of the company, below, shows that institutions own shares in the company. We can zoom in on the different ownership groups, to learn more about Carlsberg.

View our latest analysis for Carlsberg

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Carlsberg?

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.

We can see that Carlsberg does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. 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 Carlsberg, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

Carlsberg is not owned by hedge funds. Carlsberg Foundation, Endowment Arm is currently the company's largest shareholder with 31% of shares outstanding. Capital Research and Management Company is the second largest shareholder owning 5.6% of common stock, and The Vanguard Group, Inc. holds about 2.0% of the company stock.

Looking at the shareholder registry, we can see that 50% of the ownership is controlled by the top 23 shareholders, meaning that no single shareholder has a majority interest in the ownership.

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 plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too.

Insider Ownership Of Carlsberg

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.

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.

Our information suggests that Carlsberg A/S insiders own under 1% of the company. Being so large, we would not expect insiders to own a large proportion of the stock. Collectively, they own kr.52m of stock. Arguably recent buying and selling is just as important to consider. You can click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

With a 42% ownership, the general public have some degree of sway over Carlsberg. 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.

Next Steps:

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

If you would prefer discover what analysts are predicting in terms of future growth, do not miss this free report on analyst forecasts.

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.
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