Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited's (SGX:J36) top owners are retail investors with 47% stake, while 33% is held by institutions

Key Insights

• Jardine Matheson Holdings' significant retail investors ownership suggests that the key decisions are influenced by shareholders from the larger public
• 50% of the business is held by the top 20 shareholders
• 33% of Jardine Matheson Holdings is held by Institutions

If you want to know who really controls Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited (SGX:J36), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. We can see that retail investors own the lion's share in the company with 47% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

Meanwhile, institutions make up 33% of the company’s shareholders. Institutions often own shares in more established companies, while it's not unusual to see insiders own a fair bit of smaller companies.

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

Check out our latest analysis for Jardine Matheson Holdings

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Jardine Matheson Holdings?

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 Jardine Matheson Holdings. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. 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 Jardine Matheson Holdings' earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Jardine Matheson Holdings is not owned by hedge funds. Our data shows that Butterfield Asset Management Ltd. is the largest shareholder with 14% of shares outstanding. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 13% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 5.1% by the third-largest shareholder.

After doing some more digging, we found that the top 20 have the combined ownership of 50% in the company, suggesting that no single shareholder has significant control over the company.

Researching institutional ownership is a good way to gauge and filter a stock's expected performance. The same can be achieved by studying analyst sentiments. There are plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too.

Insider Ownership Of Jardine Matheson Holdings

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 see that insiders own shares in Jardine Matheson Holdings Limited. The insiders have a meaningful stake worth US$804m. we sometimes take an interest in whether they have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 47% stake in Jardine Matheson Holdings. 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

We can see that Private Companies own 13%, 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:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. For instance, we've identified 2 warning signs for Jardine Matheson Holdings 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.