Citigroup Cuts Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) Price Target to $520.00

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) had its target price trimmed by Citigroup from $535.00 to $520.00 in a research report sent to investors on Monday morning,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a buy rating on the basic materials company’s stock.

Several other equities analysts have also issued reports on LIN. UBS Group lowered their target price on shares of Linde from $510.00 to $507.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Monday, October 6th. Sanford C. Bernstein reiterated an “outperform” rating and set a $516.00 target price on shares of Linde in a report on Monday. Weiss Ratings reiterated a “buy (b)” rating on shares of Linde in a report on Wednesday, October 8th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on shares of Linde from $475.00 to $455.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a report on Monday. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have given a Buy rating and two have issued a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the stock presently has an average rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $514.83.

Linde Price Performance

LIN stock opened at $418.23 on Monday. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $461.52 and a 200-day moving average price of $463.76. Linde has a 52-week low of $408.65 and a 52-week high of $486.38. The firm has a market capitalization of $195.29 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 29.75, a PEG ratio of 2.85 and a beta of 0.91. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49, a quick ratio of 0.78 and a current ratio of 0.93.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its earnings results on Friday, October 31st. The basic materials company reported $4.21 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $4.18 by $0.03. Linde had a net margin of 20.20% and a return on equity of 19.09%. The firm had revenue of $8.62 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.62 billion. During the same period last year, the business earned $3.94 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 2.9% on a year-over-year basis. Linde has set its FY 2025 guidance at 16.350-16.450 EPS. Q4 2025 guidance at 4.100-4.200 EPS. Equities research analysts forecast that Linde will post 16.54 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Linde Announces Dividend

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, December 17th. Investors of record on Wednesday, December 3rd will be given a dividend of $1.50 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, December 3rd. This represents a $6.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.4%. Linde’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 40.19%.

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Linde

Several institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the company. Bartlett & CO. Wealth Management LLC grew its position in Linde by 1.3% in the 2nd quarter. Bartlett & CO. Wealth Management LLC now owns 249,742 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $117,174,000 after purchasing an additional 3,230 shares during the period. Markel Group Inc. grew its position in Linde by 3.1% in the 2nd quarter. Markel Group Inc. now owns 186,600 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $87,549,000 after purchasing an additional 5,600 shares during the period. Freedom Day Solutions LLC grew its position in Linde by 9.6% in the 1st quarter. Freedom Day Solutions LLC now owns 6,102 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $2,841,000 after purchasing an additional 535 shares during the period. Meiji Yasuda Asset Management Co Ltd. grew its position in Linde by 25.9% in the 1st quarter. Meiji Yasuda Asset Management Co Ltd. now owns 23,558 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $10,970,000 after purchasing an additional 4,839 shares during the period. Finally, Hourglass Capital LLC bought a new stake in Linde in the 1st quarter worth approximately $935,000. Institutional investors own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Linde Company 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.