Abeona Therapeutics Inc.'s (NASDAQ:ABEO) large institutional owners must be happy as stock continues to impress, up 12% over the past week

Key Insights

• Significantly high institutional ownership implies Abeona Therapeutics' stock price is sensitive to their trading actions
• A total of 11 investors have a majority stake in the company with 52% ownership
• Insiders have been selling lately

If you want to know who really controls Abeona Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ:ABEO), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. With 38% stake, institutions possess the maximum shares in the company. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

Last week’s 12% gain means that institutional investors were on the positive end of the spectrum even as the company has shown strong longer-term trends. The gains from last week would have further boosted the one-year return to shareholders which currently stand at 39%.

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

Check out our latest analysis for Abeona Therapeutics

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Abeona Therapeutics?

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.

As you can see, institutional investors have a fair amount of stake in Abeona Therapeutics. 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. 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 Abeona Therapeutics' earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Our data indicates that hedge funds own 21% of Abeona Therapeutics. That catches my attention because hedge funds sometimes try to influence management, or bring about changes that will create near term value for shareholders. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is Suvretta Capital Management, LLC with 9.0% of shares outstanding. Adage Capital Management, L.P. is the second largest shareholder owning 7.9% of common stock, and Janus Henderson Group plc holds about 5.8% of the company stock. Additionally, the company's CEO Vishwas Seshadri directly holds 2.3% of the total shares outstanding.

Looking at the shareholder registry, we can see that 52% of the ownership is controlled by the top 11 shareholders, meaning that no single shareholder has a majority interest in the ownership.

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 a reasonable number of analysts covering the stock, so it might be useful to find out their aggregate view on the future.

Insider Ownership Of Abeona Therapeutics

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.

We can see that insiders own shares in Abeona Therapeutics Inc.. It has a market capitalization of just US$216m, and insiders have US$11m worth of shares, in their own names. It is good to see some investment by insiders, but it might be worth checking if those insiders have been buying.

General Public Ownership

With a 30% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Abeona Therapeutics. 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:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Abeona Therapeutics better, we need to consider many other factors. Case in point: We've spotted 4 warning signs for Abeona Therapeutics you should be aware of, and 2 of them are potentially serious.

If you are like me, you may want to think about whether this company will grow or shrink. Luckily, you can check this free report showing analyst forecasts for its 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.