Private companies are Italmobiliare S.p.A.'s (BIT:ITM) biggest owners and were rewarded after market cap rose by €72m last week

Key Insights

• Significant control over Italmobiliare by private companies implies that the general public has more power to influence management and governance-related decisions
• 51% of the business is held by the top 3 shareholders
• Institutions own 22% of Italmobiliare

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If you want to know who really controls Italmobiliare S.p.A. (BIT:ITM), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 44% to be precise, is private companies. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

Clearly, private companies benefitted the most after the company's market cap rose by €72m last week.

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

See our latest analysis for Italmobiliare

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Italmobiliare?

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 Italmobiliare does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This can indicate that the company has a certain degree of credibility in the investment community. However, it is best to be wary of relying on the supposed validation that comes with institutional investors. They too, get it wrong sometimes. 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 Italmobiliare's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Hedge funds don't have many shares in Italmobiliare. The company's largest shareholder is Efiparind BV, with ownership of 33%. Serfi SpA is the second largest shareholder owning 11% of common stock, and Mediobanca Banca di Credito Finanziario S.p.A. holds about 6.8% of the company stock. In addition, we found that Carlo Pesenti, the CEO has 1.1% of the shares allocated to their name.

To make our study more interesting, we found that the top 3 shareholders have a majority ownership in the company, meaning that they are powerful enough to influence the decisions of the company.

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 Italmobiliare

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.

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.

We can report that insiders do own shares in Italmobiliare S.p.A.. This is a big company, so it is good to see this level of alignment. Insiders own €14m worth of shares (at current prices). Most would say this shows alignment of interests between shareholders and the board. Still, it might be worth checking if those insiders have been selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public-- including retail investors -- own 33% stake in the company, and hence can't 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

We can see that Private Companies own 44%, of the shares on issue. It might be worth looking deeper into this. If related parties, such as insiders, have an interest in one of these private companies, that should be disclosed in the annual report. Private companies may also have a strategic interest in the company.

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. Take risks for example - Italmobiliare has 2 warning signs (and 1 which is a bit concerning) we think you should know about.

But ultimately it is the future, not the past, that will determine how well the owners of this business will do. Therefore we think it advisable to take a look at this free report showing whether analysts are predicting a brighter 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.