Bank Julius Baer & Co. Ltd Zurich Decreases Stock Position in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Bank Julius Baer & Co. Ltd Zurich decreased its stake in shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 67.9% during the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 2,420 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 5,120 shares during the quarter. Bank Julius Baer & Co. Ltd Zurich’s holdings in Linde were worth $994,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Winder Pte. Ltd. purchased a new stake in Linde in the third quarter valued at $1,892,774,000. J.P. Morgan Private Wealth Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in Linde in the third quarter valued at $168,636,000. International Assets Investment Management LLC raised its position in Linde by 33,201.7% in the fourth quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 411,942 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $169,189,000 after purchasing an additional 410,705 shares during the period. Nordea Investment Management AB raised its position in Linde by 17.8% in the third quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 2,592,343 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $973,865,000 after purchasing an additional 391,153 shares during the period. Finally, Alphinity Investment Management Pty Ltd raised its position in Linde by 53.1% in the third quarter. Alphinity Investment Management Pty Ltd now owns 1,033,116 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $384,681,000 after purchasing an additional 358,492 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Linde news, VP Juergen Nowicki sold 13,134 shares of Linde stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $459.14, for a total transaction of $6,030,344.76. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now directly owns 6,920 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,177,248.80. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In other news, VP Juergen Nowicki sold 13,134 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $459.14, for a total value of $6,030,344.76. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now directly owns 6,920 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,177,248.80. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Also, VP Sean Durbin sold 5,277 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $467.39, for a total value of $2,466,417.03. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now directly owns 8,151 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,809,695.89. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 78,248 shares of company stock valued at $35,811,988 in the last ninety days. Insiders own 0.70% of the company’s stock.

Linde Trading Down 0.1 %

LIN opened at $443.18 on Friday. Linde plc has a 12 month low of $350.60 and a 12 month high of $477.71. The stock has a market capitalization of $213.43 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.17, a PEG ratio of 2.90 and a beta of 0.93. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.33, a current ratio of 0.80 and a quick ratio of 0.67. The business has a fifty day moving average price of $456.06 and a 200 day moving average price of $420.75.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, February 6th. The basic materials company reported $3.59 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.49 by $0.10. The company had revenue of $8.30 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.04 billion. Linde had a return on equity of 17.06% and a net margin of 18.87%. Linde’s revenue for the quarter was up 5.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business earned $3.16 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Linde plc will post 15.58 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Linde Increases Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, March 28th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, March 14th were issued a dividend of $1.39 per share. This represents a $5.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.25%. This is an increase from Linde’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.88. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, March 13th. Linde’s payout ratio is 44.13%.

Analyst Ratings Changes

LIN has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. Seaport Res Ptn downgraded Linde from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research report on Monday, January 8th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price objective on Linde from $480.00 to $540.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. Wolfe Research started coverage on Linde in a research note on Friday, March 1st. They issued a “peer perform” rating for the company. Mizuho raised Linde from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $510.00 price objective for the company in a research note on Thursday, April 18th. Finally, Citigroup cut Linde from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $475.00 to $500.00 in a research note on Wednesday, April 10th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Linde has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $456.79.

About Linde

Linde plc operates as an industrial gas company in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and South Pacific. It offers atmospheric gases, including oxygen, nitrogen, argon, and rare gases; and process gases, such as carbon dioxide, helium, hydrogen, electronic gases, specialty gases, and acetylene.