While institutions own 37% of Airbus SE (EPA:AIR), individual investors are its largest shareholders with 38% ownership

Key Insights

• The considerable ownership by individual investors in Airbus indicates that they collectively have a greater say in management and business strategy
• The top 13 shareholders own 51% of the company
• Institutional ownership in Airbus is 37%

Every investor in Airbus SE (EPA:AIR) should be aware of the most powerful shareholder groups. And the group that holds the biggest piece of the pie are individual investors with 38% ownership. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

And institutions on the other hand have a 37% ownership in the company. Institutions often own shares in more established companies, while it's not unusual to see insiders own a fair bit of smaller companies.

In the chart below, we zoom in on the different ownership groups of Airbus.

See our latest analysis for Airbus

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Airbus?

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.

As you can see, institutional investors have a fair amount of stake in Airbus. 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 Airbus' earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Airbus is not owned by hedge funds. SOGEPA is currently the largest shareholder, with 11% of shares outstanding. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 11% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 9.9% by the third-largest shareholder.

Looking at the shareholder registry, we can see that 51% of the ownership is controlled by the top 13 shareholders, meaning that no single shareholder has a majority interest in the ownership.

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 Airbus

While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. Management ultimately answers to the board. However, it is not uncommon for managers to be executive board members, especially if they are a founder or the CEO.

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 Airbus SE in their own names. But they may have an indirect interest through a corporate structure that we haven't picked up on. As it is a large company, we'd only expect insiders to own a small percentage of it. But it's worth noting that they own €6.3m 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

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

It seems that Private Companies own 26%, of the Airbus 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:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Airbus better, we need to consider many other factors.

I like to dive deeper into how a company has performed in the past. You can access this interactive graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow, for free.

If you are like me, you may want to think about whether this company will grow or shrink. Luckily, you can check this free report showing analyst forecasts for its 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.