Korea Investment CORP Trims Position in Linde PLC $LIN

Korea Investment CORP decreased its holdings in shares of Linde PLC (NASDAQ:LIN) by 18.6% in the 2nd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 363,566 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 83,057 shares during the quarter. Korea Investment CORP’s holdings in Linde were worth $170,578,000 as of its most recent filing with the SEC.

Several other institutional investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. eCIO Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Linde in the 1st quarter valued at approximately $45,000. Clal Insurance Enterprises Holdings Ltd grew its position in Linde by 445.0% in the 1st quarter. Clal Insurance Enterprises Holdings Ltd now owns 109 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $51,000 after buying an additional 89 shares during the last quarter. Nova Wealth Management Inc. purchased a new position in Linde in the 1st quarter valued at $52,000. Costello Asset Management INC acquired a new position in Linde in the 1st quarter valued at $54,000. Finally, Activest Wealth Management raised its position in Linde by 5,800.0% during the 1st quarter. Activest Wealth Management now owns 118 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $55,000 after buying an additional 116 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

LIN has been the topic of several analyst reports. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lowered their target price on shares of Linde from $475.00 to $455.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, November 3rd. Weiss Ratings reaffirmed a “buy (b-)” rating on shares of Linde in a report on Tuesday. Seaport Res Ptn upgraded Linde from a “hold” rating to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Monday, November 3rd. Citigroup lowered their price target on shares of Linde from $535.00 to $520.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, November 3rd. Finally, UBS Group decreased their price objective on shares of Linde from $510.00 to $507.00 and set a “neutral” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, October 6th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, six have assigned a Buy rating and one has assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average target price of $508.83.

Linde Trading Up 0.0%

Shares of Linde stock opened at $407.90 on Thursday. Linde PLC has a 1 year low of $406.09 and a 1 year high of $486.38. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49, a current ratio of 0.93 and a quick ratio of 0.78. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $443.79 and a 200 day moving average price of $460.26. The company has a market capitalization of $190.47 billion, a P/E ratio of 29.01, a P/E/G ratio of 2.85 and a beta of 0.91.

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

Linde Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, December 17th. Investors of record on Wednesday, December 3rd will be paid a $1.50 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Wednesday, December 3rd. This represents a $6.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.5%. Linde’s payout ratio is presently 40.19%.

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.