Proficio Capital Partners LLC Grows Stock Holdings in Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Proficio Capital Partners LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 2.8% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 2,422 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after purchasing an additional 65 shares during the quarter. Proficio Capital Partners LLC’s holdings in Linde were worth $1,125,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors have also recently added to or reduced their stakes in the business. Crestwood Advisors Group LLC acquired a new stake in Linde during the third quarter worth about $317,000. Dana Investment Advisors Inc. purchased a new position in shares of Linde in the 3rd quarter valued at $207,000. Mercer Global Advisors Inc. ADV lifted its holdings in shares of Linde by 4.7% during the 3rd quarter. Mercer Global Advisors Inc. ADV now owns 20,002 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $7,448,000 after acquiring an additional 891 shares in the last quarter. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC boosted its position in Linde by 2.1% during the 3rd quarter. Integrated Wealth Concepts LLC now owns 5,849 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $2,178,000 after purchasing an additional 118 shares during the period. Finally, Advisors Capital Management LLC increased its holdings in Linde by 949.0% in the 3rd quarter. Advisors Capital Management LLC now owns 10,070 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $3,750,000 after purchasing an additional 9,110 shares in the last quarter. 82.80% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

LIN has been the topic of a number of analyst reports. BMO Capital Markets dropped their price objective on shares of Linde from $510.00 to $475.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research note on Monday, May 6th. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their price target on shares of Linde from $480.00 to $540.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, April 11th. Mizuho upped their price objective on shares of Linde from $510.00 to $512.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Friday, May 3rd. HSBC dropped their target price on Linde from $458.00 to $452.00 and set a “buy” rating on the stock in a research report on Monday, May 6th. Finally, Citigroup lowered Linde from a “buy” rating to a “neutral” rating and raised their price objective for the company from $475.00 to $500.00 in a research note on Wednesday, April 10th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $465.92.

Linde Stock Performance

Linde stock traded down $4.54 during mid-day trading on Tuesday, reaching $431.20. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 1,052,130 shares, compared to its average volume of 2,043,047. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.38. Linde plc has a twelve month low of $361.02 and a twelve month high of $477.71. The business has a 50 day moving average price of $434.08 and a 200-day moving average price of $435.24. The firm has a market cap of $207.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.45, a PEG ratio of 2.73 and a beta of 0.93.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 2nd. The basic materials company reported $3.75 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.68 by $0.07. Linde had a net margin of 19.26% and a return on equity of 17.49%. The business had revenue of $8.10 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.38 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $3.42 EPS. The company’s quarterly revenue was down 1.1% on a year-over-year basis. Sell-side analysts predict that Linde plc will post 15.51 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Linde Announces Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, June 18th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, June 4th were paid a $1.39 dividend. This represents a $5.56 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.29%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Tuesday, June 4th. 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.