Prudential plc's (LON:PRU) institutional investors lost 4.6% last week but have benefitted from longer-term gains

Yahoo

26-05-2025

Institutions' substantial holdings in Prudential implies that they have significant influence over the company's share price
50% of the business is held by the top 19 shareholders
Recent purchases by insiders
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To get a sense of who is truly in control of Prudential plc (LON:PRU), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. We can see that institutions own the lion's share in the company with 80% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.
Institutional investors endured the highest losses after the company's market cap fell by UK£1.1b last week. However, the 10% one-year return to shareholders may have helped lessen their pain. They should, however, be mindful of further losses in the future.
Let's take a closer look to see what the different types of shareholders can tell us about Prudential.
See our latest analysis for Prudential
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.
Prudential already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in the company. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. It is not uncommon to see a big share price drop if two large institutional investors try to sell out of a stock at the same time. So it is worth checking the past earnings trajectory of Prudential, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.
Since institutional investors own more than half the issued stock, the board will likely have to pay attention to their preferences. We note that hedge funds don't have a meaningful investment in Prudential. BlackRock, Inc. is currently the largest shareholder, with 7.8% of shares outstanding. With 5.5% and 5.0% of the shares outstanding respectively, Norges Bank Investment Management and The Vanguard Group, Inc. are the second and third largest shareholders.
After doing some more digging, we found that the top 19 have the combined ownership of 50% in the company, suggesting that no single shareholder has significant control over the company.
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.
While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. Company management run the business, but the CEO will answer to the board, even if he or she is a member of it.
Most consider insider ownership a positive because it can indicate the board is well aligned with other shareholders. However, on some occasions too much power is concentrated within this group.
Our data suggests that insiders own under 1% of Prudential plc in their own names. Being so large, we would not expect insiders to own a large proportion of the stock. Collectively, they own UK£6.6m of stock. In this sort of situation, it can be more interesting to see if those insiders have been buying or selling.
With a 13% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Prudential. While this group can't necessarily call the shots, it can certainly have a real influence on how the company is run.
It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Prudential better, we need to consider many other factors.
Many find it useful to take an in depth look at how a company has performed in the past. You can access this detailed graph of past earnings, revenue and cash flow.
If you are like me, you may want to think about whether this company will grow or shrink. Luckily, you can check this free report showing analyst forecasts for its future.
NB: Figures in this article are calculated using data from the last twelve months, which refer to the 12-month period ending on the last date of the month the financial statement is dated. This may not be consistent with full year annual report figures.
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