Could The National Fuel Gas Company (NYSE:NFG) Ownership Structure Tell Us Something Useful?

A look at the shareholders of National Fuel Gas Company (NYSE:NFG) can tell us which group is most powerful. Institutions often own shares in more established companies, while it's not unusual to see insiders own a fair bit of smaller companies. Companies that used to be publicly owned tend to have lower insider ownership.

National Fuel Gas is a pretty big company. It has a market capitalization of US$6.5b. 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 National Fuel Gas.

Check out our latest analysis for National Fuel Gas

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About National Fuel Gas?

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.

We can see that National Fuel Gas does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. 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 National Fuel Gas' earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Investors should note that institutions actually own more than half the company, so they can collectively wield significant power. We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in National Fuel Gas. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is The Vanguard Group, Inc. with 11% of shares outstanding. BlackRock, Inc. is the second largest shareholder owning 8.7% of common stock, and State Street Global Advisors, Inc. holds about 8.0% of the company stock.

After doing some more digging, we found that the top 13 have the combined ownership of 50% in the company, suggesting that no single shareholder has significant control over the company.

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 National Fuel Gas

While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. Company management run the business, but the CEO will answer to the board, even if he or she is a member of it.

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.

Our most recent data indicates that insiders own some shares in National Fuel Gas 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$108m worth of shares (at current prices). It is good to see this level of investment by insiders. You can check here to see if those insiders have been buying recently.

General Public Ownership

The general public-- including retail investors -- own 24% stake in the company, and hence can't easily be ignored. 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.

Next Steps:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand National Fuel Gas better, we need to consider many other factors. Case in point: We've spotted 3 warning signs for National Fuel Gas you should be aware of.

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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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.