What Kind Of Shareholders Hold The Majority In Shenzhen Expressway Company Limited's (HKG:548) Shares?

If you want to know who really controls Shenzhen Expressway Company Limited (HKG:548), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. Generally speaking, as a company grows, institutions will increase their ownership. Conversely, insiders often decrease their ownership over time. We also tend to see lower insider ownership in companies that were previously publicly owned.

Shenzhen Expressway isn't enormous, but it's not particularly small either. It has a market capitalization of HK$20b, which means it would generally expect to see some institutions on the share registry. Our analysis of the ownership of the company, below, shows that institutional investors have bought into the company. We can zoom in on the different ownership groups, to learn more about Shenzhen Expressway.

View our latest analysis for Shenzhen Expressway

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Shenzhen Expressway?

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 Shenzhen Expressway. 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 Shenzhen Expressway's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Shenzhen Expressway. Shenzhen International Holdings Limited is currently the company's largest shareholder with 52% of shares outstanding. This essentially means that they have extensive influence, if not outright control, over the future of the corporation. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 6.6% and 2.8% of the stock.

While it makes sense to study institutional ownership data for a company, it also makes sense to study analyst sentiments to know which way the wind is blowing. There are plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too.

Insider Ownership Of Shenzhen Expressway

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 most recent data indicates that insiders own less than 1% of Shenzhen Expressway Company Limited. But they may have an indirect interest through a corporate structure that we haven't picked up on. Keep in mind that it's a big company, and the insiders own HK$145m worth of shares. The absolute value might be more important than the proportional share. 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

The general public, with a 18% stake in the company, will not easily be ignored. 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 11%, of the company's shares. 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 52% of the Shenzhen Expressway 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:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Shenzhen Expressway better, we need to consider many other factors. Be aware that Shenzhen Expressway is showing 4 warning signs in our investment analysis , and 1 of those doesn't sit too well with us...

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. 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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