Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) Shares Bought by SlateStone Wealth LLC

SlateStone Wealth LLC raised its stake in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 3.7% during the second quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The firm owned 4,370 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after purchasing an additional 155 shares during the period. SlateStone Wealth LLC’s holdings in Linde were worth $1,918,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Linde by 0.9% during the 1st quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 44,676,156 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $20,744,033,000 after acquiring an additional 405,952 shares in the last quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD increased its stake in Linde by 1.3% during the 4th quarter. Price T Rowe Associates Inc. MD now owns 10,796,924 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $4,434,406,000 after buying an additional 141,322 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in Linde during the 4th quarter worth $3,066,825,000. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main increased its stake in Linde by 3.6% during the 4th quarter. DZ BANK AG Deutsche Zentral Genossenschafts Bank Frankfurt am Main now owns 3,959,993 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,624,462,000 after buying an additional 138,585 shares during the period. Finally, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board increased its stake in Linde by 2.4% during the 1st quarter. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board now owns 2,893,414 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,343,470,000 after buying an additional 66,880 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several equities research analysts recently issued reports on LIN shares. JPMorgan Chase & Co. lifted their price target on shares of Linde from $430.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, August 5th. Citigroup boosted their target price on shares of Linde from $470.00 to $480.00 and gave the stock a “neutral” rating in a research report on Friday, July 12th. Bank of America boosted their target price on shares of Linde from $495.00 to $516.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, August 5th. HSBC dropped their target price on shares of Linde from $458.00 to $452.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research report on Monday, May 6th. Finally, UBS Group dropped their target price 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. Six research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Linde has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $484.18.

Linde Stock Performance

LIN traded up $2.72 on Monday, hitting $468.46. 1,216,283 shares of the company’s stock were exchanged, compared to its average volume of 1,915,339. The firm has a market cap of $225.18 billion, a PE ratio of 36.34, a P/E/G ratio of 2.86 and a beta of 0.94. Linde plc has a twelve month low of $361.02 and a twelve month high of $477.71. The stock has a fifty day moving average of $445.66 and a two-hundred day moving average of $445.18. The company has a current ratio of 0.95, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.43.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 2nd. The basic materials company reported $3.85 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates 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 for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.30 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the company posted $3.57 earnings per share. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 1.2% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts anticipate that Linde plc will post 15.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Linde Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, September 18th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, September 4th will be paid a $1.39 dividend. The ex-dividend date is Wednesday, September 4th. This represents a $5.56 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 1.19%. Linde’s payout ratio is 43.13%.

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.