Point72 Europe London LLP Takes Position in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Point72 Europe London LLP acquired a new position in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) in the second quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor acquired 22,700 shares of the basic materials company’s stock, valued at approximately $9,961,000.

Other large investors have also modified their holdings of the company. Clearbridge Investments LLC boosted its holdings in Linde by 566.9% during the first quarter. Clearbridge Investments LLC now owns 1,833,465 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $851,314,000 after acquiring an additional 1,558,538 shares during the period. Swedbank AB acquired a new stake in shares of Linde in the second quarter valued at about $420,720,000. ProShare Advisors LLC increased its stake in shares of Linde by 91.6% in the first quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 968,402 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $449,648,000 after purchasing an additional 463,096 shares during the period. iA Global Asset Management Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Linde during the 1st quarter worth about $210,480,000. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its position in shares of Linde by 0.9% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 44,676,156 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $20,744,033,000 after purchasing an additional 405,952 shares during the last quarter. 82.80% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

LIN has been the topic of a number of research analyst reports. Citigroup raised their target price on Linde from $470.00 to $480.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, July 12th. BMO Capital Markets reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $477.00 target price on shares of Linde in a research report on Friday, August 30th. UBS Group reduced their price target on shares of Linde from $490.00 to $475.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, July 9th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. boosted their price objective on shares of Linde from $430.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, August 5th. Finally, Bank of America increased their target price on shares of Linde from $495.00 to $516.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, August 5th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have given a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Linde has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $484.18.

Linde Price Performance

Shares of Linde stock opened at $479.35 on Wednesday. The firm has a market cap of $228.89 billion, a P/E ratio of 37.19, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 2.99 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a current ratio of 0.95. Linde plc has a twelve month low of $361.02 and a twelve month high of $480.76. The firm’s 50-day simple moving average is $459.53 and its 200-day simple moving average is $449.40.

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

Linde Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, September 18th. Shareholders of record on Wednesday, September 4th were paid a dividend of $1.39 per share. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $5.56 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.16%. Linde’s dividend payout ratio is currently 43.13%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Linde

In other news, VP John Panikar sold 10,025 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, September 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $462.75, for a total value of $4,639,068.75. Following the sale, the vice president now owns 17,584 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $8,136,996. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through the SEC website. Company insiders own 0.70% of the company’s stock.

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.