Thelikely treasures at pittsburgh antique shops big shareholder groups in The Sherwin-Williams Company (

NYSE:SHW

) have power over the company. Institutions often own shares in more established companies, while it’s not unusual to see insiders own a fair bit of smaller companies. We also tend to see lower insider ownership in companies that were previously publicly owned.

Sherwin-Williams has a market capitalization of US$36b, so it’s too big to fly under the radar. We’d expect to see both institutions and retail investors owning a portion of the company. Our analysis of the ownership of the company, below, shows that institutions own shares in the company. We can zoom in on the different ownership groups, to learn more about SHW.

View our latest analysis for Sherwin-Williams

NYSE:SHW Ownership Summary January 2nd 19

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Sherwin-Williams?

Many institutions measure their performance against an index that approximates the local market. So they usually pay more attention to companies that are included in major indices.

Sherwin-Williams already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own 78% of the company. This implies the analysts working for those institutions have looked at the stock and they like it. But just like anyone else, they could be wrong. When multiple institutions own a stock, there’s always a risk that they are in a ‘crowded trade’. When such a trade goes wrong, multiple parties may compete to sell stock fast. This risk is higher in a company without a history of growth. You can see Sherwin-Williams’s historic earnings and revenue, below, but keep in mind there’s always more to the story.

NYSE:SHW Income Statement Export January 2nd 19

Institutional investors own over 50% of the company, so together than can probably strongly influence board decisions. Hedge funds don’t have many shares in Sherwin-Williams. There are plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too.

Insider Ownership Of Sherwin-Williams

While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. Management ultimately answers to the board. However, it is not uncommon for managers to be executive board members, especially if they are a founder or the CEO.

I generally consider insider ownership to be a good thing. However, on some occasions it makes it more difficult for other shareholders to hold the board accountable for decisions.

Our information suggests that The Sherwin-Williams Company insiders own under 1% of the company. It is a very large company, so it would be surprising to see insiders own a large proportion of the company. Though their holding amount to less than 1%, we can see that board members collectively own US$134m worth of shares (at current prices). In this sort of situation, it can be more interesting to

see if those insiders have been buying or selling.

Story continues

General Public Ownership

With a 11% ownership, the general public have some degree of sway over SHW. While this size of ownership may not be enough to sway a policy decision in their favour, they can still make a collective impact on company policies.

Next Steps:

I find it very interesting to look at who exactly owns a company. But to truly gain insight, we need to consider other information, too.

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

.

But ultimately

it is the future

, not the past, that will determine how well the owners of this business will do. Therefore we think it advisable to take a look at

this free report showing whether analysts are predicting a brighter 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.

To help readers see past the short term volatility of the financial market, we aim to bring you a long-term focused research analysis purely driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis does not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements.

The author is an independent contributor and at the time of publication had no position in the stocks mentioned. For errors that warrant correction please contact the editor at

[email protected]

.

View comments

• ·German industrial order rise more than expected in October
• ·U.S. Supreme Court justices question human rights claims against Nestle and Cargill
• ·ROSEN, A RESPECTED AND LEADING FIRM, Encourages GSX Techedu Inc. Investors to Contact Firm Before Deadline in Class Action Seeking Recovery of Investor Losses – GSX
• ·Are Insiders Buying Arena Events Group plc (LON:ARE) Stock?
• ·The Returns At Treatt (LON:TET) Provide Us With Signs Of What's To Come
• ·Unknown gunmen kill three in daylight in Afghan capital Kabul
• ·State-backed hackers targeting coronavirus workers, US and UK warn
• ·Preview: Signet Jewelers's Earnings
• ·Petrolympic Announces Closing of Private Placement
• ·Why Foundation Building Materials (FBM) Could Be an Impressive Growth Stock
• ·Guidewire (GWRE) Q3 Earnings & Revenues Top Estimates, Stock Up
• ·Some Atlas (NYSE:ATCO) Shareholders Are Down 47%
• ·EU open to compensating firms hit by coronavirus, more help for Italy
• ·The Downsides of 401(k)s That You’ve Never Heard Of
• ·Were Hedge Funds Wrong About Crowding Into RealPage, Inc. (RP)?
• ·Arch Coal (ARCH) Down 22.8% Since Last Earnings Report: Can It Rebound?