BLB&B Advisors LLC Has $8.33 Million Stake in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

BLB&B Advisors LLC grew its stake in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 1.7% during the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The firm owned 17,477 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after acquiring an additional 297 shares during the period. BLB&B Advisors LLC’s holdings in Linde were worth $8,334,000 as of its most recent filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A number of other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the stock. Retirement Group LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Linde during the first quarter worth $25,000. Summit Securities Group LLC bought a new position in Linde during the second quarter worth about $28,000. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC bought a new position in Linde during the second quarter worth about $33,000. Valued Wealth Advisors LLC raised its stake in Linde by 49.0% in the 1st quarter. Valued Wealth Advisors LLC now owns 73 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $34,000 after purchasing an additional 24 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Kozak & Associates Inc. bought a new stake in Linde in the 3rd quarter valued at about $34,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research analysts have recently commented on LIN shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. raised their target price on shares of Linde from $430.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a report on Monday, August 5th. Bank of America raised their price objective on Linde from $495.00 to $516.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, August 5th. Citigroup increased their target price on Linde from $470.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a report on Friday, July 12th. UBS Group cut their price objective on shares of Linde from $490.00 to $475.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, July 9th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $477.00 target price on shares of Linde in a research report on Friday, August 30th. Six analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, Linde presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $484.18.

Linde Trading Down 0.3 %

Shares of LIN stock opened at $481.95 on Wednesday. The company has a quick ratio of 0.80, a current ratio of 0.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43. The firm has a market capitalization of $230.13 billion, a P/E ratio of 36.68, a P/E/G ratio of 3.08 and a beta of 0.94. Linde plc has a twelve month low of $361.02 and a twelve month high of $487.49. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $471.01 and its 200 day simple moving average is $450.80.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its quarterly earnings data on Friday, August 2nd. The basic materials company reported $3.85 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.79 by $0.06. Linde had a return on equity of 17.92% and a net margin of 19.49%. The company had revenue of $8.30 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.30 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the firm posted $3.57 earnings per share. The firm’s revenue was up 1.2% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Linde plc will post 15.52 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Linde Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, September 18th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, September 4th were issued a dividend of $1.39 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $5.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.15%. Linde’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 42.31%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, VP John Panikar sold 10,025 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, September 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $462.75, for a total transaction of $4,639,068.75. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 17,584 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,136,996. This trade represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. 0.60% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

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.