Aristides Capital LLC Takes $439,000 Position in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Aristides Capital LLC bought a new stake in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) during the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund bought 1,000 shares of the basic materials company’s stock, valued at approximately $439,000.

A number of other large investors have also recently bought and sold shares of LIN. Clearbridge Investments LLC increased its stake in Linde by 566.9% in 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 purchasing an additional 1,558,538 shares during the period. Swedbank AB acquired a new position in Linde in the 2nd quarter valued at about $420,720,000. ProShare Advisors LLC raised its stake in Linde by 91.6% during the 1st quarter. ProShare Advisors LLC now owns 968,402 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $449,648,000 after acquiring an additional 463,096 shares during the last quarter. iA Global Asset Management Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Linde in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $210,480,000. Finally, Vanguard Group Inc. increased its holdings in shares of Linde by 0.9% in the first quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 44,676,156 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $20,744,033,000 after purchasing an additional 405,952 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages recently weighed in on LIN. Citigroup increased their price target on Linde from $470.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, July 12th. Barclays upped their price objective on shares of Linde from $460.00 to $510.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, August 5th. UBS Group dropped their price target on shares of Linde from $490.00 to $475.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, July 9th. Bank of America raised 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. Finally, BMO Capital Markets reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $477.00 target price on shares of Linde in a research report on Friday, August 30th. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $484.18.

Insider Transactions at Linde

In other Linde news, VP John Panikar sold 10,025 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction 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 of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $8,136,996. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Corporate insiders own 0.70% of the company’s stock.

Linde Price Performance

Linde stock opened at $476.86 on Tuesday. The firm has a fifty day moving average of $462.10 and a 200-day moving average of $449.58. Linde plc has a 52-week low of $361.02 and a 52-week high of $483.36. The company has a quick ratio of 0.80, a current ratio of 0.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43. The firm has a market capitalization of $229.22 billion, a P/E ratio of 36.99, a PEG ratio of 3.00 and a beta of 0.94.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its quarterly earnings results 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 firm had revenue of $8.30 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.30 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $3.57 EPS. Linde’s quarterly revenue was up 1.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts predict that Linde plc will post 15.54 EPS for the current year.

Linde Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared 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 1.17%. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, September 4th. Linde’s payout ratio is currently 43.13%.

Linde Company 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.