Key Insights

• Given the large stake in the stock by institutions, ASX's stock price might be vulnerable to their trading decisions

• A total of 25 investors have a majority stake in the company with 50% ownership

• Insiders have bought recently

A look at the shareholders of ASX Limited (ASX:ASX) can tell us which group is most powerful. We can see that institutions own the lion's share in the company with 52% ownership. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

No shareholder likes losing money on their investments, especially institutional investors who saw their holdings drop 5.0% in value last week. Still, the 16% one-year gains may have helped mitigate their overall losses. They should, however, be mindful of further losses in the future.

Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of ASX, beginning with the chart below.

See our latest analysis for ASX

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About ASX?

Institutional investors commonly compare their own returns to the returns of a commonly followed index. So they generally do consider buying larger companies that are included in the relevant benchmark index.

We can see that ASX does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This implies the analysts working for those institutions have looked at the stock and they like it. But just like anyone else, they could be wrong. If multiple institutions change their view on a stock at the same time, you could see the share price drop fast. It's therefore worth looking at ASX's earnings history below. Of course, the future is what really matters.

Investors should note that institutions actually own more than half the company, so they can collectively wield significant power. ASX is not owned by hedge funds. Our data shows that UniSuper Limited is the largest shareholder with 12% of shares outstanding. Meanwhile, the second and third largest shareholders, hold 11% and 7.1%, of the shares outstanding, respectively.

Our studies suggest that the top 25 shareholders collectively control less than half of the company's shares, meaning that the company's shares are widely disseminated and there is no dominant shareholder.

While it makes sense to study institutional ownership data for a company, it also makes sense to study analyst sentiments to know which way the wind is blowing. There are a reasonable number of analysts covering the stock, so it might be useful to find out their aggregate view on the future.