Institutional shareholders may be less affected by Jeudan A/S' (CPH:JDAN) pullback last week after a year of 3.2% returns

Key Insights

• Significantly high institutional ownership implies Jeudan's stock price is sensitive to their trading actions
• A total of 2 investors have a majority stake in the company with 83% ownership
• Ownership research, combined with past performance data can help provide a good understanding of opportunities in a stock

If you want to know who really controls Jeudan A/S (CPH:JDAN), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. We can see that institutions own the lion's share in the company with 44% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

Institutional investors was the group most impacted after the company's market cap fell to kr.13b last week. However, the 3.2% one-year return to shareholders may have helped lessen their pain. They should, however, be mindful of further losses in the future.

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

See our latest analysis for Jeudan

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Jeudan?

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.

Jeudan already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in the company. 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. 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 Jeudan's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Hedge funds don't have many shares in Jeudan. William Demant Invest A/S is currently the company's largest shareholder with 42% of shares outstanding. With 41% and 1.0% of the shares outstanding respectively, Chr. Augustinus Fabrikker Aktieselskab and Nordea Investment Management, AB are the second and third largest shareholders.

After doing some more digging, we found that the top 2 shareholders collectively control more than half of the company's shares, implying that they have considerable power to influence the company's decisions.

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. As far as we can tell there isn't analyst coverage of the company, so it is probably flying under the radar.

Insider Ownership Of Jeudan

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. 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.

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 suggests that insiders own under 1% of Jeudan A/S in their own names. However, it's possible that insiders might have an indirect interest through a more complex structure. It's a big company, so even a small proportional interest can create alignment between the board and shareholders. In this case insiders own kr.16m worth of shares. 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

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 15% stake in Jeudan. 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 Company Ownership

Our data indicates that Private Companies hold 41%, 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:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Jeudan better, we need to consider many other factors. Take risks for example - Jeudan has 2 warning signs we think you should be aware of.

Of course this may not be the best stock to buy. Therefore, you may wish to see our free collection of interesting prospects boasting favorable financials.

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.