Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) Now Covered by Analysts at Royal Bank of Canada

Royal Bank of Canada began coverage on shares of Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) in a research note issued on Friday,Briefing.com Automated Import reports. The brokerage set an “outperform” rating and a $576.00 price target on the basic materials company’s stock. Royal Bank of Canada’s price objective suggests a potential upside of 22.42% from the stock’s current price.

Other research analysts also recently issued research reports about the stock. Argus raised shares of Linde to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, April 8th. Sanford C. Bernstein upgraded Linde to a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 3rd. Three analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, eight have given a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $510.40.

Linde Price Performance

LIN opened at $470.53 on Friday. The company has a market capitalization of $221.49 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.57, a PEG ratio of 3.08 and a beta of 0.97. The company has a current ratio of 0.89, a quick ratio of 0.76 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.39. Linde has a 12-month low of $408.65 and a 12-month high of $487.49. The business’s fifty day simple moving average is $454.21 and its 200-day simple moving average is $449.06.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 1st. The basic materials company reported $3.95 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $3.92 by $0.03. The company had revenue of $8.11 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.24 billion. Linde had a net margin of 19.89% and a return on equity of 18.71%. Linde’s revenue was up .1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the company posted $3.75 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts anticipate that Linde will post 16.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Insider Activity at Linde

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

Institutional Investors Weigh In On Linde

A number of hedge funds have recently modified their holdings of LIN. Brighton Jones LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Linde during the 4th quarter valued at approximately $2,752,000. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC grew its holdings in shares of Linde by 14.1% during the 4th quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC now owns 777 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $325,000 after purchasing an additional 96 shares during the period. Strategic Financial Concepts LLC acquired a new stake in shares of Linde during the 4th quarter worth about $28,000. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC raised its holdings in Linde by 2.8% in the 4th quarter. Allspring Global Investments Holdings LLC now owns 69,527 shares of the basic materials company’s stock valued at $28,796,000 after buying an additional 1,915 shares during the period. Finally, Van ECK Associates Corp boosted its stake in Linde by 740.9% during the fourth quarter. Van ECK Associates Corp now owns 94,125 shares of the basic materials company’s stock worth $39,407,000 after buying an additional 82,931 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 82.80% of the company’s stock.

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.