In This Article:
Key Insights
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Cassava Sciences' significant individual investors ownership suggests that the key decisions are influenced by shareholders from the larger public
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36% of the business is held by the top 25 shareholders
If you want to know who really controls Cassava Sciences, Inc. (NASDAQ:SAVA), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. With 60% stake, individual investors possess the maximum shares in the company. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).
While institutions who own 29% came under pressure after market cap dropped to US$1.3b last week,individual investors took the most losses.
In the chart below, we zoom in on the different ownership groups of Cassava Sciences.
View our latest analysis for Cassava Sciences
What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Cassava Sciences?
Institutions typically measure themselves against a benchmark when reporting to their own investors, so they often become more enthusiastic about a stock once it's included in a major index. We would expect most companies to have some institutions on the register, especially if they are growing.
We can see that Cassava Sciences does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This can indicate that the company has a certain degree of credibility in the investment community. However, it is best to be wary of relying on the supposed validation that comes with institutional investors. They too, get it wrong sometimes. 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 Cassava Sciences, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.
Hedge funds don't have many shares in Cassava Sciences. The company's largest shareholder is BlackRock, Inc., with ownership of 6.7%. With 5.6% and 5.4% of the shares outstanding respectively, The Vanguard Group, Inc. and Matthew Nachtrab are the second and third largest shareholders. In addition, we found that Richard Barry, the CEO has 1.0% of the shares allocated to their name.
Our studies suggest that the top 25 shareholders collectively control less than half of the company's shares, meaning that the company's shares are widely disseminated and there is no dominant shareholder.
While it makes sense to study institutional ownership data for a company, it also makes sense to study analyst sentiments to know which way the wind is blowing. While there is some analyst coverage, the company is probably not widely covered. So it could gain more attention, down the track.