Institutional owners may consider drastic measures as Crescent Energy Company's (NYSE:CRGY) recent US$60m drop adds to long-term losses

Key Insights

• Significantly high institutional ownership implies Crescent Energy's stock price is sensitive to their trading actions
• A total of 25 investors have a majority stake in the company with 49% ownership
• Insiders have been buying lately

A look at the shareholders of Crescent Energy Company (NYSE:CRGY) can tell us which group is most powerful. And the group that holds the biggest piece of the pie are institutions with 62% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

And institutional investors endured the highest losses after the company's share price fell by 3.2% last week. This set of investors may especially be concerned about the current loss, which adds to a one-year loss of 14% for shareholders. Also referred to as "smart money", institutions have a lot of sway over how a stock's price moves. As a result, if the downtrend continues, institutions may face pressures to sell Crescent Energy, which might have negative implications on individual investors.

In the chart below, we zoom in on the different ownership groups of Crescent Energy.

Check out our latest analysis for Crescent Energy

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Crescent Energy?

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.

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

Institutional investors own over 50% of the company, so together than can probably strongly influence board decisions. Crescent Energy is not owned by hedge funds. The company's largest shareholder is The Vanguard Group, Inc., with ownership of 7.2%. With 4.8% and 4.7% of the shares outstanding respectively, American Century Investment Management Inc and BlackRock, Inc. are the second and third largest shareholders.

A deeper look at our ownership data shows that the top 25 shareholders collectively hold less than half of the register, suggesting a large group of small holders where 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 Crescent Energy

The definition of an insider can differ slightly between different countries, but members of the board of directors always count. Company management run the business, but the CEO will answer to the board, even if he or she is a member of it.

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 some shares in Crescent Energy Company. It is a pretty big company, so it is generally a positive to see some potentially meaningful alignment. In this case, they own around US$91m worth of shares (at current prices). If you would like to explore the question of insider alignment, you can click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public-- including retail investors -- own 35% stake in the company, and hence can't easily be ignored. 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.

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 example, we've discovered 5 warning signs for Crescent Energy (2 are potentially serious!) that you should be aware of before investing here.

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.