Dorsey & Whitney Trust CO LLC Buys 95 Shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Dorsey & Whitney Trust CO LLC boosted its stake in shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 1.9% in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 5,023 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after purchasing an additional 95 shares during the quarter. Dorsey & Whitney Trust CO LLC’s holdings in Linde were worth $2,103,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Helios Capital Management PTE. Ltd. boosted its position in shares of Linde by 85.2% in the fourth quarter. Helios Capital Management PTE. Ltd. now owns 2,500 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $1,047,000 after acquiring an additional 1,150 shares during the period. Channel Wealth LLC boosted its position in shares of Linde by 30.4% in the fourth quarter. Channel Wealth LLC now owns 7,385 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $3,092,000 after acquiring an additional 1,723 shares during the period. M&T Bank Corp boosted its position in shares of Linde by 6.7% in the third quarter. M&T Bank Corp now owns 79,472 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $37,898,000 after acquiring an additional 5,021 shares during the period. Nordea Investment Management AB boosted its position in shares of Linde by 2.2% in the fourth quarter. Nordea Investment Management AB now owns 2,145,643 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $898,188,000 after acquiring an additional 46,843 shares during the period. Finally, SYM FINANCIAL Corp bought a new stake in shares of Linde in the fourth quarter valued at about $625,000. 82.80% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, VP David P. Strauss sold 2,218 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $434.35, for a total value of $963,388.30. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now owns 25,926 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $11,260,958.10. This represents a 7.88 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, Director Paula Rosput Reynolds bought 100 shares of Linde stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, December 12th. The stock was bought at an average price of $441.34 per share, for a total transaction of $44,134.00. Following the completion of the acquisition, the director now directly owns 233 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $102,832.22. The trade was a 75.19 % increase in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this purchase can be found here. Over the last 90 days, insiders sold 14,377 shares of company stock valued at $6,567,231. 0.60% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have recently issued reports on LIN shares. Erste Group Bank reissued a “hold” rating on shares of Linde in a research report on Tuesday, November 19th. TD Cowen raised shares of Linde from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and boosted their target price for the company from $480.00 to $515.00 in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Finally, Citigroup dropped their price target on Linde from $490.00 to $480.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research note on Wednesday, December 18th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have issued a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $501.82.

Linde Stock Up 0.6 %

Shares of NASDAQ LIN opened at $468.77 on Friday. The company has a current ratio of 0.89, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.39. The company has a market cap of $221.69 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.44, a PEG ratio of 3.08 and a beta of 0.94. Linde plc has a 12 month low of $410.69 and a 12 month high of $487.49. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $444.80 and a two-hundred day moving average price of $455.29.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last issued its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The basic materials company reported $3.97 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.93 by $0.04. Linde had a return on equity of 18.71% and a net margin of 19.89%. As a group, analysts forecast that Linde plc will post 16.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Linde Increases Dividend

The firm also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 27th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, March 13th will be paid a dividend of $1.50 per share. This is an increase from Linde’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.39. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, March 13th. This represents a $6.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.28%. Linde’s payout ratio is presently 44.09%.

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.