Avior Wealth Management LLC Sells 80 Shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Avior Wealth Management LLC reduced its position in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 7.5% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The firm owned 987 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 80 shares during the period. Avior Wealth Management LLC’s holdings in Linde were worth $405,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also added to or reduced their stakes in the company. Annapolis Financial Services LLC raised its stake in Linde by 122.6% in the 3rd quarter. Annapolis Financial Services LLC now owns 69 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $26,000 after acquiring an additional 38 shares during the period. Carmel Capital Partners LLC bought a new stake in Linde in the 3rd quarter valued at about $26,000. Provence Wealth Management Group bought a new stake in Linde in the 3rd quarter valued at about $29,000. FWL Investment Management LLC bought a new stake in Linde in the 4th quarter valued at about $30,000. Finally, RVW Wealth LLC bought a new stake in Linde in the 3rd quarter valued at about $38,000. 82.80% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities research analysts recently issued reports on the company. Seaport Res Ptn cut Linde from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating in a research note on Monday, January 8th. UBS Group cut Linde from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and upped their price target for the company from $482.00 to $510.00 in a research report on Wednesday, March 27th. Wolfe Research initiated coverage on Linde in a research report on Friday, March 1st. They set a “peer perform” rating on the stock. Mizuho upgraded Linde from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and set a $510.00 price target on the stock in a research report on Thursday. Finally, Citigroup cut Linde from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and upped their price target for the company from $475.00 to $500.00 in a research report on Wednesday, April 10th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Linde has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $456.79.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Linde news, SVP Oliver Pfann sold 300 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 8th. The stock was sold at an average price of $414.61, for a total value of $124,383.00. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. In other news, CFO Matthew J. White sold 51,231 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, March 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $455.84, for a total transaction of $23,353,139.04. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 57,634 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $26,271,882.56. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, SVP Oliver Pfann sold 300 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $414.61, for a total value of $124,383.00. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 78,248 shares of company stock valued at $35,811,988 over the last quarter. 0.70% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Linde Stock Down 0.1 %

Shares of NASDAQ LIN opened at $446.43 on Friday. Linde plc has a 12 month low of $350.60 and a 12 month high of $477.71. The company has a current ratio of 0.80, a quick ratio of 0.67 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.33. The firm has a market capitalization of $214.99 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 35.43, a PEG ratio of 2.92 and a beta of 0.93. The business has a 50-day moving average of $453.35 and a 200-day moving average of $417.76.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Tuesday, February 6th. The basic materials company reported $3.59 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.49 by $0.10. Linde had a return on equity of 17.06% and a net margin of 18.87%. The company had revenue of $8.30 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.04 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm earned $3.16 earnings per share. Linde’s revenue was up 5.1% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts expect that Linde plc will post 15.58 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Linde Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, March 28th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, March 14th were paid a $1.39 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Wednesday, March 13th. This represents a $5.56 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.25%. This is a positive change from Linde’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.88. Linde’s dividend payout ratio is currently 44.13%.

About Linde

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.