Oil India Limited's (NSE:OIL) top owners are state or government with 57% stake, while 22% is held by institutions

Key Insights

• The considerable ownership by state or government in Oil India indicates that they collectively have a greater say in management and business strategy
• India owns 57% of the company
• Institutional ownership in Oil India is 22%

If you want to know who really controls Oil India Limited (NSE:OIL), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. With 57% stake, state or government possess the maximum shares in the company. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

And institutions on the other hand have a 22% ownership in the company. Institutions will often hold stock in bigger companies, and we expect to see insiders owning a noticeable percentage of the smaller ones.

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

View our latest analysis for Oil India

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Oil India?

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

Oil India is not owned by hedge funds. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is India with 57% of shares outstanding. This implies that they have majority interest control of the future of the company. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 6.5% and 4.9% of the stock.

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

Insider Ownership Of Oil India

The definition of an insider can differ slightly between different countries, but members of the board of directors always count. 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.

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 most recent data indicates that insiders own less than 1% of Oil India Limited. 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 ₹12m worth of shares. 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, who are usually individual investors, hold a 11% stake in Oil India. 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.

Public Company Ownership

It appears to us that public companies own 9.9% of Oil India. 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:

I find it very interesting to look at who exactly owns a company. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too. For instance, we've identified 1 warning sign for Oil India that you should be aware of.

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. 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.