American National Bank & Trust Sells 101 Shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

American National Bank & Trust reduced its stake in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 0.4% during the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The firm owned 24,972 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 101 shares during the period. Linde makes up 1.4% of American National Bank & Trust’s holdings, making the stock its 22nd biggest holding. American National Bank & Trust’s holdings in Linde were worth $11,908,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in LIN. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its stake in 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 buying an additional 405,952 shares during the period. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its holdings in shares of Linde by 1.3% in the fourth quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 10,796,924 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $4,434,406,000 after acquiring an additional 141,322 shares in the last quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main raised its position in shares of Linde by 3.6% during the fourth quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main now owns 3,959,993 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,624,462,000 after purchasing an additional 138,585 shares during the period. Ameriprise Financial Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Linde by 0.4% during the 2nd quarter. Ameriprise Financial Inc. now owns 3,449,218 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,513,551,000 after purchasing an additional 15,187 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board grew its position in shares of Linde by 7.6% in the 2nd quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 3,112,160 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,365,647,000 after purchasing an additional 218,746 shares during the period. 82.80% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Ratings Changes

A number of research analysts have weighed in on LIN shares. Barclays lifted their price target 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. Bank of America boosted their price objective on shares of Linde from $495.00 to $516.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, August 5th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. increased their target price on Linde from $430.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, August 5th. Citigroup lifted their price target on Linde from $470.00 to $480.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Friday, July 12th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets reaffirmed an “outperform” rating and set a $477.00 price objective on shares of Linde in a research report on Friday, August 30th. Six equities 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, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $484.18.

Insider Activity

In other Linde news, VP John Panikar sold 10,025 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 10th. The stock was 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 in the company, valued at $8,136,996. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through this link. 0.70% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Linde Stock Performance

Shares of NASDAQ LIN opened at $475.84 on Thursday. The stock has a market capitalization of $227.21 billion, a PE ratio of 36.92, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 0.94. Linde plc has a 52 week low of $361.02 and a 52 week high of $483.36. The stock has a 50 day moving average price of $463.30 and a 200 day moving average price of $449.81. 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 (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its earnings results 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 business had revenue of $8.30 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.30 billion. Linde had a net margin of 19.49% and a return on equity of 17.92%. The firm’s revenue was up 1.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period last year, the business earned $3.57 earnings per share. Analysts predict that Linde plc will post 15.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Linde Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, September 18th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, September 4th were paid a dividend of $1.39 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $5.56 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.17%. Linde’s dividend payout ratio is presently 43.13%.

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.