Individual investors in Nordic Mining ASA (OB:NOM) are its biggest bettors, and their bets paid off as stock gained 11% last week

Key Insights

• The considerable ownership by individual investors in Nordic Mining indicates that they collectively have a greater say in management and business strategy
• A total of 7 investors have a majority stake in the company with 50% ownership
• Recent purchases by insiders

To get a sense of who is truly in control of Nordic Mining ASA (OB:NOM), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. With 47% stake, individual investors possess the maximum shares in the company. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

Clearly, individual investors benefitted the most after the company's market cap rose by kr195m last week.

Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of Nordic Mining, beginning with the chart below.

View our latest analysis for Nordic Mining

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Nordic Mining?

Institutions typically measure themselves against a benchmark when reporting to their own investors, so they often become more enthusiastic about a stock once it's included in a major index. We would expect most companies to have some institutions on the register, especially if they are growing.

Nordic Mining already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in the company. 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. When multiple institutions own a stock, there's always a risk that they are in a 'crowded trade'. When such a trade goes wrong, multiple parties may compete to sell stock fast. This risk is higher in a company without a history of growth. You can see Nordic Mining's historic earnings and revenue below, but keep in mind there's always more to the story.

It looks like hedge funds own 9.8% of Nordic Mining shares. That's interesting, because hedge funds can be quite active and activist. Many look for medium term catalysts that will drive the share price higher. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is Fjordavegen Holding As with 15% of shares outstanding. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 15% and 9.8% of the stock.

We also observed that the top 7 shareholders account for more than half of the share register, with a few smaller shareholders to balance the interests of the larger ones to a certain extent.

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. Our information suggests that there isn't any analyst coverage of the stock, so it is probably little known.

Insider Ownership Of Nordic Mining

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.

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 information suggests that Nordic Mining ASA insiders own under 1% of the company. But they may have an indirect interest through a corporate structure that we haven't picked up on. It appears that the board holds about kr11m worth of stock. This compares to a market capitalization of kr2.0b. Many tend to prefer to see a board with bigger shareholdings. A good next step might be to take a look at this free summary of insider buying and selling.

General Public Ownership

With a 47% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Nordic Mining. While this group can't necessarily call the shots, it can certainly have a real influence on how the company is run.

Private Company Ownership

Our data indicates that Private Companies hold 16%, 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.

Public Company Ownership

We can see that public companies hold 15% of the Nordic Mining shares on issue. This may be a strategic interest and the two companies may have related business interests. It could be that they have de-merged. This holding is probably worth investigating further.

Next Steps:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Nordic Mining better, we need to consider many other factors. To that end, you should learn about the 2 warning signs we've spotted with Nordic Mining (including 1 which is potentially serious) .

If you would prefer check out another company -- one with potentially superior financials -- then do not miss this free list of interesting companies, backed by strong financial data.

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.