In This Article:
Key Insights
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Significant control over Mercury NZ by sovereign wealth funds implies that the general public has more power to influence management and governance-related decisions
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The largest shareholder of the company is New Zealand Superannuation Fund with a 51% stake
If you want to know who really controls Mercury NZ Limited (NZSE:MCY), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. We can see that sovereign wealth funds own the lion's share in the company with 51% ownership. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).
Meanwhile, individual investors make up 38% of the company’s shareholders.
Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of Mercury NZ, beginning with the chart below.
Check out our latest analysis for Mercury NZ
What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Mercury NZ?
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.
As you can see, institutional investors have a fair amount of stake in Mercury NZ. 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 Mercury NZ, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.
Mercury NZ is not owned by hedge funds. New Zealand Superannuation Fund is currently the largest shareholder, with 51% of shares outstanding. This essentially means that they have extensive influence, if not outright control, over the future of the corporation. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 2.0% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 1.5% by the third-largest shareholder.
Researching institutional ownership is a good way to gauge and filter a stock's expected performance. The same can be achieved by studying analyst sentiments. There are plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too.
Insider Ownership Of Mercury NZ
The definition of company insiders can be subjective and does vary between jurisdictions. Our data reflects individual insiders, capturing board members at the very least. Management ultimately answers to the board. However, it is not uncommon for managers to be executive board members, especially if they are a founder or the CEO.