Basler Aktiengesellschaft's (ETR:BSL) largest shareholders are private companies with 56% ownership, individual investors own 21%

Simply Wall St

Wed, Dec 7, 2022, 9:05 PM 4 min read

If you want to know who really controls Basler Aktiengesellschaft (ETR:BSL), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 56% to be precise, is private companies. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

Individual investors, on the other hand, account for 21% of the company's stockholders.

Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of Basler, beginning with the chart below.

Check out our latest analysis for Basler

ownership-breakdown — XTRA:BSL Ownership Breakdown December 8th 2022

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Basler?

Many institutions measure their performance against an index that approximates the local market. So they usually pay more attention to companies that are included in major indices.

Basler already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in the company. This implies the analysts working for those institutions have looked at the stock and they like it. But just like anyone else, they could be wrong. It is not uncommon to see a big share price drop if two large institutional investors try to sell out of a stock at the same time. So it is worth checking the past earnings trajectory of Basler, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

earnings-and-revenue-growth — XTRA:BSL Earnings and Revenue Growth December 8th 2022

We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Basler. Basler Beteiligungs-Gmbh & Co. Kg is currently the company's largest shareholder with 56% of shares outstanding. This implies that they have majority interest control of the future of the company. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 6.0% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 5.0% by the third-largest shareholder. Additionally, the company's CEO Dietmar Ley directly holds 3.8% of the total shares outstanding.

While studying institutional ownership for a company can add value to your research, it is also a good practice to research analyst recommendations to get a deeper understand of a stock's expected performance. There are a reasonable number of analysts covering the stock, so it might be useful to find out their aggregate view on the future.

Insider Ownership Of Basler

While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. The company management answer to the board and the latter should represent the interests of shareholders. Notably, sometimes top-level managers are on the board themselves.

Insider ownership is positive when it signals leadership are thinking like the true owners of the company. However, high insider ownership can also give immense power to a small group within the company. This can be negative in some circumstances.

Shareholders would probably be interested to learn that insiders own shares in Basler Aktiengesellschaft. It is a pretty big company, so it is generally a positive to see some potentially meaningful alignment. In this case, they own around €38m worth of shares (at current prices). If you would like to explore the question of insider alignment, you can click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 21% stake in Basler. This size of ownership, while considerable, may not be enough to change company policy if the decision is not in sync with other large shareholders.

Private Company Ownership

We can see that Private Companies own 56%, of the shares on issue. It's hard to draw any conclusions from this fact alone, so its worth looking into who owns those private companies. Sometimes insiders or other related parties have an interest in shares in a public company through a separate private company.

Next Steps:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. For instance, we've identified 1 warning sign for Basler that you should be aware of.

If you are like me, you may want to think about whether this company will grow or shrink. Luckily, you can check this free report showing analyst forecasts for its future.

NB: Figures in this article are calculated using data from the last twelve months, which refer to the 12-month period ending on the last date of the month the financial statement is dated. This may not be consistent with full year annual report figures.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team (at) simplywallst.com.

This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.

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