MCF Advisors LLC Buys 74 Shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

MCF Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 74.7% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 173 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after buying an additional 74 shares during the period. MCF Advisors LLC’s holdings in Linde were worth $76,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors have also bought and sold shares of the stock. Retirement Group LLC bought a new position in shares of Linde during the 1st quarter worth approximately $25,000. Summit Securities Group LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Linde during the second quarter valued at approximately $28,000. First Pacific Financial bought a new stake in Linde during the first quarter worth $30,000. Scarborough Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Linde in the fourth quarter worth $30,000. Finally, Valued Wealth Advisors LLC boosted its position in Linde by 49.0% in the first quarter. Valued Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 73 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $34,000 after purchasing an additional 24 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

LIN has been the topic of a number of recent analyst reports. Bank of America lifted their target price on Linde from $495.00 to $516.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, August 5th. BMO Capital Markets reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and issued a $477.00 price objective on shares of Linde in a research report on Friday, August 30th. Barclays boosted their target price on shares of Linde from $460.00 to $510.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, August 5th. Citigroup raised their price target on shares of Linde from $470.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, July 12th. Finally, UBS Group lowered their price target on shares of Linde from $490.00 to $475.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Tuesday, July 9th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Linde has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $484.18.

Linde Stock Performance

Shares of LIN opened at $456.85 on Friday. Linde plc has a 52-week low of $361.02 and a 52-week high of $479.79. The stock’s 50-day simple moving average is $451.18 and its 200 day simple moving average is $447.87. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a current ratio of 0.95. The stock has a market capitalization of $218.15 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.44, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 0.94.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 2nd. The basic materials company reported $3.85 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.79 by $0.06. The firm had revenue of $8.30 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.30 billion. Linde had a net margin of 19.49% and a return on equity of 17.92%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm posted $3.57 earnings per share. Research analysts forecast that Linde plc will post 15.54 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Linde Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, September 18th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, September 4th will be issued a $1.39 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $5.56 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.22%. Linde’s payout ratio is currently 43.13%.

Linde Profile

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.