Maia Wealth LLC Purchases 57 Shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN)

Maia Wealth LLC increased its position in shares of Linde plc (NASDAQ:LIN) by 13.0% in the 4th quarter, HoldingsChannel reports. The firm owned 496 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after acquiring an additional 57 shares during the quarter. Maia Wealth LLC’s holdings in Linde were worth $218,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Howard Capital Management Group LLC bought a new position in shares of Linde in the third quarter worth about $252,000. Farther Finance Advisors LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Linde by 16.9% in the third quarter. Farther Finance Advisors LLC now owns 2,912 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,389,000 after acquiring an additional 421 shares during the last quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. lifted its holdings in shares of Linde by 3.2% in the third quarter. Robeco Institutional Asset Management B.V. now owns 543,857 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $259,344,000 after acquiring an additional 16,965 shares during the last quarter. Cohen Capital Management Inc. lifted its holdings in shares of Linde by 6.6% in the third quarter. Cohen Capital Management Inc. now owns 2,102 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,002,000 after acquiring an additional 130 shares during the last quarter. Finally, National Pension Service lifted its holdings in shares of Linde by 14.3% in the third quarter. National Pension Service now owns 940,201 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $448,344,000 after acquiring an additional 117,436 shares during the last quarter. Institutional investors own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of research analysts have recently commented on LIN shares. Citigroup dropped their target price on shares of Linde from $490.00 to $480.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a report on Wednesday, December 18th. TD Cowen raised Linde from a “hold” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their price objective for the company from $480.00 to $515.00 in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Finally, Erste Group Bank reaffirmed a “hold” rating on shares of Linde in a research note on Tuesday, November 19th. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and nine have assigned a buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $501.82.

Insider Buying and Selling at Linde

In other Linde news, VP Guillermo Bichara sold 4,385 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, December 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $460.73, for a total transaction of $2,020,301.05. Following the transaction, the vice president now directly owns 22,776 shares in the company, valued at approximately $10,493,586.48. This represents a 16.14 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this link. Also, VP Juergen Nowicki sold 6,782 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Thursday, February 20th. The stock was sold at an average price of $459.62, for a total value of $3,117,142.84. Following the transaction, the vice president now owns 14,765 shares in the company, valued at $6,786,289.30. The trade was a 31.48 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 16,285 shares of company stock valued at $7,423,986. 0.60% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Linde Stock Performance

NASDAQ:LIN opened at $462.25 on Tuesday. The company has a market capitalization of $218.60 billion, a PE ratio of 33.96, a P/E/G ratio of 3.08 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $441.48 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $455.03. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.39, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a current ratio of 0.89. Linde plc has a fifty-two week low of $410.69 and a fifty-two week high of $487.49.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its earnings results on Thursday, February 6th. The basic materials company reported $3.97 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.93 by $0.04. Linde had a net margin of 19.89% and a return on equity of 18.71%. Research analysts anticipate that Linde plc will post 16.54 earnings per share for the current year.

Linde Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 27th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, March 13th will be given a dividend of $1.50 per share. This represents a $6.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 1.30%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Thursday, March 13th. This is an increase from Linde’s previous quarterly dividend of $1.39. Linde’s dividend payout ratio is currently 44.09%.

Linde Company Profile

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.