Pinnacle Bancorp Inc. Acquires 34 Shares of Linde PLC (NASDAQ:LIN)

Pinnacle Bancorp Inc. boosted its position in Linde PLC (NASDAQ:LIN) by 2.6% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The fund owned 1,340 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after purchasing an additional 34 shares during the period. Pinnacle Bancorp Inc.’s holdings in Linde were worth $624,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in shares of Linde during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $2,901,853,000. Freemont Capital Pte Ltd bought a new position in shares of Linde in the fourth quarter worth $2,128,233,000. GAMMA Investing LLC raised its position in shares of Linde by 58,312.0% in the first quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 3,415,935 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $1,590,596,000 after buying an additional 3,410,087 shares in the last quarter. Capital World Investors boosted its stake in Linde by 34.4% during the fourth quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 11,547,765 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $4,834,631,000 after buying an additional 2,957,604 shares during the period. Finally, Castlekeep Investment Advisors LLC purchased a new position in Linde during the fourth quarter worth about $468,360,000. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

LIN has been the topic of several recent analyst reports. Sanford C. Bernstein raised Linde to a “strong-buy” rating in a report on Thursday, April 3rd. Royal Bank Of Canada assumed coverage on shares of Linde in a research report on Friday, June 13th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $576.00 price objective on the stock. Finally, Argus raised shares of Linde to a “strong-buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, April 8th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $510.40.

Linde Stock Up 0.7%

Shares of Linde stock opened at $463.16 on Wednesday. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.45, a quick ratio of 0.80 and a current ratio of 0.94. Linde PLC has a 52-week low of $408.65 and a 52-week high of $487.49. The company’s 50 day moving average price is $458.21 and its 200-day moving average price is $449.28. The stock has a market capitalization of $218.02 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.64, a P/E/G ratio of 3.24 and a beta of 0.97.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last released its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, May 1st. The basic materials company reported $3.95 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $3.92 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $8.11 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $8.24 billion. Linde had a net margin of 20.02% and a return on equity of 18.95%. Linde’s revenue was up .1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the prior year, the firm earned $3.75 earnings per share. Equities research analysts forecast that Linde PLC will post 16.54 EPS for the current year.

Linde Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, June 18th. Stockholders of record on Wednesday, June 4th were issued a dividend of $1.50 per share. This represents a $6.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.30%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, June 4th. Linde’s payout ratio is presently 43.57%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, VP Sean Durbin sold 7,261 shares of Linde stock in a transaction on Thursday, May 22nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $456.42, for a total transaction of $3,314,065.62. Following the transaction, the vice president now owns 8,151 shares in the company, valued at approximately $3,720,279.42. The trade was a 47.11% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. Also, VP David P. Strauss sold 1,987 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Friday, May 16th. The stock was sold at an average price of $457.04, for a total value of $908,138.48. Following the sale, the vice president now owns 22,639 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $10,346,928.56. This represents a 8.07% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. 0.70% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

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.