Today, I will be analyzing Neos Therapeutics Inc’s (NASDAQ:NEOS) recent ownership structure, an important but not-so-popular subject among individual investors. Ownership structure of a company has been found to affect share performance over time. Since the effect of an active institutional investor with a similar ownership as a passive pension-fund can be vastly different on a company’s corporate governance and accountability of shareholders, investors should take a closer look at NEOS’s shareholder registry.

See our latest analysis for Neos Therapeutics

Institutional Ownership

In NEOS’s case, institutional ownership stands at 50.75%, significant enough to cause considerable price moves in the case of large institutional transactions, especially when there is a low level of public shares available on the market to trade. However, as not all institutions are alike, such high volatility events, especially in the short-term, have been more frequently linked to active market participants like hedge funds. Hedge funds, considered active investors, hold a 5.02% stake in the company, which may be the cause of high short-term volatility in the stock price. But I also examine other ownership types and their potential impact on NEOS’s investment case.

Insider Ownership

I find insiders are another important group of stakeholders, who are directly involved in making key decisions related to the use of capital. In essence, insider ownership is more about the alignment of shareholders’ interests with the management. 20.75% ownership of NEOS insiders is large enough to make an impact on shareholder returns. In general, this level of insider ownership has negatively affected underperforming (consistently low PE ratio) companies and positively affected the companies that outperform (consistently high PE ratio). Another aspect of insider ownership is to learn about their recent transactions. Insiders buying company shares can be a positive indicator of future performance, but a selling decision can simply be driven by personal financial needs.

General Public Ownership

A big stake of 23.38% in NEOS is held by the general public. This size of ownership gives retail investors collective power in deciding on major policy decisions such as executive compensation, appointment of directors and acquisitions of businesses. This level of ownership gives retail investors the power to sway key policy decisions such as board composition, executive compensation, and potential acquisitions. This is a positive sign for an investor who wants to be involved in key decision-making of the company.