Key Insights

• Institutions' substantial holdings in Profound Medical implies that they have significant influence over the company's share price

• The top 13 shareholders own 50% of the company

• Ownership research along with analyst forecasts data help provide a good understanding of opportunities in a stock

A look at the shareholders of Profound Medical Corp. (TSE:PRN) can tell us which group is most powerful. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 50% to be precise, is institutions. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

Given the vast amount of money and research capacities at their disposal, institutional ownership tends to carry a lot of weight, especially with individual investors. Therefore, a good portion of institutional money invested in the company is usually a huge vote of confidence on its future.

In the chart below, we zoom in on the different ownership groups of Profound Medical.

Check out our latest analysis for Profound Medical

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Profound Medical?

Institutions typically measure themselves against a benchmark when reporting to their own investors, so they often become more enthusiastic about a stock once it's included in a major index. We would expect most companies to have some institutions on the register, especially if they are growing.

As you can see, institutional investors have a fair amount of stake in Profound Medical. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. It is not uncommon to see a big share price drop if two large institutional investors try to sell out of a stock at the same time. So it is worth checking the past earnings trajectory of Profound Medical, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Profound Medical. Our data shows that Gagnon Securities, LLC is the largest shareholder with 6.2% of shares outstanding. With 6.1% and 5.5% of the shares outstanding respectively, Fidelity International Ltd and FMR LLC are the second and third largest shareholders. In addition, we found that Arun Menawat, the CEO has 2.2% of the shares allocated to their name.

A closer look at our ownership figures suggests that the top 13 shareholders have a combined ownership of 50% implying that no single shareholder has a majority.

Researching institutional ownership is a good way to gauge and filter a stock's expected performance. The same can be achieved by studying analyst sentiments. Quite a few analysts cover the stock, so you could look into forecast growth quite easily.