Institutional owners may ignore Metropolitan Bank Holding Corp.'s (NYSE:MCB) recent US$72m market cap decline as longer-term profits stay in the green

Key Insights

• Institutions' substantial holdings in Metropolitan Bank Holding implies that they have significant influence over the company's share price
• The top 12 shareholders own 51% of the company
• Recent sales by insiders

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If you want to know who really controls Metropolitan Bank Holding Corp. (NYSE:MCB), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. We can see that institutions own the lion's share in the company with 76% ownership. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

No shareholder likes losing money on their investments, especially institutional investors who saw their holdings drop 11% in value last week. However, the 42% one-year return to shareholders might have softened the blow. They should, however, be mindful of further losses in the future.

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

View our latest analysis for Metropolitan Bank Holding

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Metropolitan Bank Holding?

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.

Metropolitan Bank Holding 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. 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 Metropolitan Bank Holding, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

Since institutional investors own more than half the issued stock, the board will likely have to pay attention to their preferences. We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Metropolitan Bank Holding. BlackRock, Inc. is currently the largest shareholder, with 9.3% of shares outstanding. FMR LLC is the second largest shareholder owning 7.7% of common stock, and Patriot Financial Manager, L.P. holds about 6.8% of the company stock. Furthermore, CEO Mark DeFazio is the owner of 0.9% of the company's shares.

A closer look at our ownership figures suggests that the top 12 shareholders have a combined ownership of 51% implying that no single shareholder has a majority.

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 Metropolitan Bank Holding

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 Metropolitan Bank Holding Corp.. It has a market capitalization of just US$634m, and insiders have US$32m worth of shares, in their own names. Some would say this shows alignment of interests between shareholders and the board. But it might be worth checking if those insiders have been selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 12% stake in Metropolitan Bank Holding. 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 Equity Ownership

With a stake of 6.8%, private equity firms could influence the Metropolitan Bank Holding board. Sometimes we see private equity stick around for the long term, but generally speaking they have a shorter investment horizon and -- as the name suggests -- don't invest in public companies much. After some time they may look to sell and redeploy capital elsewhere.

Next Steps:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. Take risks for example - Metropolitan Bank Holding has 1 warning sign we think you should be aware of.

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. 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.