Benjamin Edwards Inc. Buys 38 Shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Benjamin Edwards Inc. raised its stake in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 3.4% during the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 1,141 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after purchasing an additional 38 shares during the period. Benjamin Edwards Inc.’s holdings in Linde were worth $500,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. US Bancorp DE lifted its position in Linde by 0.4% during the fourth quarter. US Bancorp DE now owns 327,373 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $134,456,000 after acquiring an additional 1,305 shares during the last quarter. SageView Advisory Group LLC lifted its holdings in Linde by 35.4% during the 4th quarter. SageView Advisory Group LLC now owns 4,472 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,824,000 after purchasing an additional 1,170 shares during the last quarter. Skopos Labs Inc. acquired a new stake in Linde during the 4th quarter worth approximately $1,211,000. Nixon Peabody Trust Co. boosted its stake in Linde by 481.1% in the 4th quarter. Nixon Peabody Trust Co. now owns 37,085 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $15,231,000 after purchasing an additional 30,703 shares during the period. Finally, Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. grew its holdings in Linde by 1.5% in the 4th quarter. Nomura Asset Management Co. Ltd. now owns 231,681 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $95,154,000 after buying an additional 3,313 shares in the last quarter. 82.80% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

A number of equities research analysts have recently weighed in on the company. Barclays lifted their target price on Linde from $460.00 to $510.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, August 5th. Citigroup lifted their price objective 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. UBS Group decreased their target price on shares of Linde from $490.00 to $475.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, July 9th. Bank of America lifted their price target 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. Finally, BMO Capital Markets reiterated an “outperform” rating and issued a $477.00 price target on shares of Linde in a research note on Friday, August 30th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $484.18.

Insider Activity

In related news, VP John Panikar sold 10,025 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, September 10th. The shares were sold at an average price of $462.75, for a total transaction of $4,639,068.75. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 17,584 shares in the company, valued at approximately $8,136,996. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. 0.70% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Linde Stock Performance

NASDAQ LIN opened at $471.91 on Friday. Linde plc has a 1 year low of $361.02 and a 1 year high of $479.79. The firm has a market capitalization of $225.34 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 36.61, a P/E/G ratio of 2.97 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a current ratio of 0.95, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43. The firm’s 50 day simple moving average is $458.07 and its 200 day simple moving average is $449.38.

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

Linde Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, September 18th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, September 4th were issued a $1.39 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $5.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.18%. Linde’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 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.