Linde PLC (NASDAQ:LIN) Stake Boosted by SouthState Corp

SouthState Corp grew its stake in shares of Linde PLC (NASDAQ:LIN) by 2.5% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 2,292 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after acquiring an additional 56 shares during the period. SouthState Corp’s holdings in Linde were worth $1,067,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also modified their holdings of the company. Prosperity Consulting Group LLC grew its holdings in shares of Linde by 4.5% during the 4th quarter. Prosperity Consulting Group LLC now owns 7,788 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $3,261,000 after acquiring an additional 332 shares in the last quarter. Jump Financial LLC grew its holdings in shares of Linde by 300.3% during the 4th quarter. Jump Financial LLC now owns 26,150 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $10,948,000 after acquiring an additional 19,618 shares in the last quarter. Taurus Asset Management LLC grew its holdings in shares of Linde by 0.9% during the 4th quarter. Taurus Asset Management LLC now owns 55,009 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $23,031,000 after acquiring an additional 484 shares in the last quarter. AlTi Global Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Linde during the 4th quarter valued at $971,000. Finally, Truist Financial Corp grew its holdings in shares of Linde by 75.0% during the 1st quarter. Truist Financial Corp now owns 193,563 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $90,131,000 after acquiring an additional 82,952 shares in the last quarter. 82.80% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Linde news, Director Stephen F. Angel sold 50,309 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, August 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $473.38, for a total transaction of $23,815,274.42. Following the completion of the transaction, the director owned 480,543 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $227,479,445.34. The trade was a 9.48% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, VP Sean Durbin sold 7,261 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $456.42, for a total transaction of $3,314,065.62. Following the transaction, the vice president directly owned 8,151 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,720,279.42. This represents a 47.11% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 59,557 shares of company stock valued at $28,037,479 in the last quarter. Insiders own 0.70% of the company’s stock.

Linde Stock Up 0.6%

Linde stock opened at $472.42 on Monday. The firm has a market cap of $221.52 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.60, a P/E/G ratio of 3.12 and a beta of 0.92. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49, a current ratio of 0.93 and a quick ratio of 0.78. Linde PLC has a fifty-two week low of $408.65 and a fifty-two week high of $487.49. The firm has a fifty day moving average price of $467.81 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $459.00.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its earnings results on Friday, August 1st. The basic materials company reported $4.09 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.03 by $0.06. The firm had revenue of $8.50 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.35 billion. Linde had a net margin of 20.20% and a return on equity of 19.09%. The business’s revenue was up 2.3% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business earned $3.85 EPS. As a group, analysts forecast that Linde PLC will post 16.54 earnings per share for the current year.

Linde Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 18th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, September 4th will be given a dividend of $1.50 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, September 4th. This represents a $6.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.3%. Linde’s payout ratio is currently 42.67%.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms recently issued reports on LIN. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price objective on shares of Linde from $470.00 to $475.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, August 4th. Citigroup raised shares of Linde from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and lifted their price objective for the company from $500.00 to $535.00 in a research note on Monday, June 30th. UBS Group lifted their price objective on shares of Linde from $485.00 to $504.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 9th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada began coverage on shares of Linde in a research note on Friday, June 13th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $576.00 price objective for the company. Two analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, seven have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $519.63.

Linde 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.