What Kind Of Investors Own Most Of Entergy Corporation (NYSE:ETR)?

A look at the shareholders of Entergy Corporation (NYSE:ETR) can tell us which group is most powerful. Large companies usually have institutions as shareholders, and we usually see insiders owning shares in smaller companies. We also tend to see lower insider ownership in companies that were previously publicly owned.

Entergy is a pretty big company. It has a market capitalization of US$20b. Normally institutions would own a significant portion of a company this size. In the chart below, we can see that institutional investors have bought into the company. We can zoom in on the different ownership groups, to learn more about Entergy.

See our latest analysis for Entergy

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Entergy?

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.

Entergy 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 Entergy, (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. Hedge funds don't have many shares in Entergy. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is The Vanguard Group, Inc. with 12% of shares outstanding. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 7.4% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 5.2% by the third-largest shareholder.

After doing some more digging, we found that the top 15 have the combined ownership of 50% in the company, suggesting that no single shareholder has significant control over the company.

While it makes sense to study institutional ownership data for a company, it also makes sense to study analyst sentiments to know which way the wind is blowing. Quite a few analysts cover the stock, so you could look into forecast growth quite easily.

Insider Ownership Of Entergy

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 less than 1% of Entergy Corporation. As it is a large company, we'd only expect insiders to own a small percentage of it. But it's worth noting that they own US$55m worth of shares. It is always good to see at least some insider ownership, but it might be worth checking if those insiders have been selling.

General Public Ownership

With a 12% ownership, the general public have some degree of sway over Entergy. 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 Entergy better, we need to consider many other factors. Consider risks, for instance. Every company has them, and we've spotted 1 warning sign for Entergy you should know about.

But ultimately it is the future, not the past, that will determine how well the owners of this business will do. Therefore we think it advisable to take a look at this free report showing whether analysts are predicting a brighter 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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