Marshall Wace LLP Boosts Stock Holdings in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Marshall Wace LLP boosted its position in shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 55.3% in the 2nd quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 547,016 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after buying an additional 194,825 shares during the period. Marshall Wace LLP owned 0.11% of Linde worth $240,036,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Vanguard Group Inc. boosted its holdings 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. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD boosted its holdings in shares of Linde by 1.3% during the 4th 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 purchasing an additional 141,322 shares during the last quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main boosted its holdings in shares of Linde by 3.6% during the 4th 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 last quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board boosted its holdings in shares of Linde by 7.6% during the 2nd quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 3,112,160 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,365,647,000 after purchasing an additional 218,746 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Janus Henderson Group PLC boosted its holdings in shares of Linde by 1.2% during the 1st quarter. Janus Henderson Group PLC now owns 1,953,147 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $906,730,000 after purchasing an additional 23,155 shares during the last quarter. 82.80% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

LIN has been the topic of several recent research reports. Barclays boosted 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 upped their price objective on Linde from $470.00 to $480.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, July 12th. JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their price objective on Linde from $430.00 to $480.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, August 5th. Bank of America upped their price objective on Linde from $495.00 to $516.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Monday, August 5th. Finally, UBS Group decreased their price objective on 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 issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $484.18.

Linde Stock Up 1.2 %

Linde stock opened at $477.36 on Tuesday. Linde plc has a twelve month low of $361.02 and a twelve month high of $479.79. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $458.85 and its 200-day simple moving average is $449.28. 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 has a market capitalization of $229.46 billion, a P/E ratio of 37.03, a P/E/G ratio of 2.97 and a beta of 0.94.

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

Linde Dividend Announcement

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

Insider Transactions at Linde

In other news, VP John Panikar sold 10,025 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $462.75, for a total transaction of $4,639,068.75. Following the sale, the vice president now owns 17,584 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,136,996. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 0.70% of the company’s stock.

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.