Positive week for Corcept Therapeutics Incorporated (NASDAQ:CORT) institutional investors who lost 9.2% over the past year

Key Insights

• Significantly high institutional ownership implies Corcept Therapeutics' stock price is sensitive to their trading actions
• A total of 8 investors have a majority stake in the company with 52% ownership
• 11% of Corcept Therapeutics is held by insiders

To get a sense of who is truly in control of Corcept Therapeutics Incorporated (NASDAQ:CORT), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. And the group that holds the biggest piece of the pie are institutions with 71% ownership. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

After a year of 9.2% losses, last week’s 5.5% gain would be welcomed by institutional investors as a likely sign that returns might start trending higher.

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

See our latest analysis for Corcept Therapeutics

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Corcept Therapeutics?

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 Corcept 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. 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 Corcept Therapeutics, (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. It would appear that 6.8% of Corcept Therapeutics shares are controlled by hedge funds. 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. Our data shows that BlackRock, Inc. is the largest shareholder with 15% of shares outstanding. With 9.6% and 6.8% of the shares outstanding respectively, The Vanguard Group, Inc. and Renaissance Technologies LLC are the second and third largest shareholders. Additionally, the company's CEO Joseph Belanoff directly holds 2.6% of the total shares outstanding.

On further inspection, we found that more than half the company's shares are owned by the top 8 shareholders, suggesting that the interests of the larger shareholders are balanced out to an extent by the smaller ones.

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 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 Corcept Therapeutics

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.

Insider ownership is positive when it signals leadership are thinking like the true owners of the company. However, high insider ownership can also give immense power to a small group within the company. This can be negative in some circumstances.

It seems insiders own a significant proportion of Corcept Therapeutics Incorporated. Insiders own US$262m worth of shares in the US$2.3b company. That's quite meaningful. Most would be pleased to see the board is investing alongside them. You may wish to access this free chart showing recent trading by insiders.

General Public Ownership

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 11% stake in Corcept 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:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important.

I like to dive deeper into how a company has performed in the past. You can find historic revenue and earnings in this detailed graph.

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.