Cigna Investments Inc. New Sells 81 Shares of Linde PLC $LIN

Cigna Investments Inc. New trimmed its position in shares of Linde PLC (NASDAQ:LIN) by 1.7% during the 1st quarter, according to the company in its most recent 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 4,806 shares of the basic materials company’s stock after selling 81 shares during the quarter. Cigna Investments Inc. New’s holdings in Linde were worth $2,238,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other large investors have also recently made changes to their positions in the company. North Capital Inc. purchased a new position in Linde in the 1st quarter worth approximately $25,000. Putney Financial Group LLC purchased a new position in Linde in the 4th quarter worth approximately $31,000. Dunhill Financial LLC purchased a new position in Linde in the 4th quarter worth approximately $34,000. Capital A Wealth Management LLC purchased a new stake in Linde during the 4th quarter valued at $37,000. Finally, Abound Financial LLC purchased a new stake in Linde during the 1st quarter valued at $41,000. 82.80% of the stock is currently owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

LIN has been the subject of a number of research reports. UBS Group boosted their target price on shares of Linde from $485.00 to $504.00 and gave the company a “neutral” rating in a research note on Wednesday, July 9th. Royal Bank Of Canada assumed coverage on shares of Linde in a research note on Friday, June 13th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $576.00 price target on the stock. Citigroup upgraded shares of Linde from a “neutral” rating to a “buy” rating and upped their target price for the company from $500.00 to $535.00 in a research report on Monday, June 30th. Finally, JPMorgan Chase & Co. upped their target price on shares of Linde from $470.00 to $475.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, August 4th. Two analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, seven have assigned a Buy rating and two have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Buy” and an average price target of $519.63.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, Director Stephen F. Angel sold 50,309 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Thursday, August 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $473.38, for a total transaction of $23,815,274.42. Following the completion of the sale, the director owned 480,543 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $227,479,445.34. The trade was a 9.48% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Corporate insiders own 0.70% of the company’s stock.

Linde Price Performance

Shares of LIN opened at $478.29 on Monday. The company has a market cap of $224.27 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 34.02, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.16 and a beta of 0.95. Linde PLC has a twelve month low of $408.65 and a twelve month high of $487.49. The company has a quick ratio of 0.78, a current ratio of 0.93 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.49. The company has a 50 day moving average of $471.33 and a two-hundred day moving average of $461.93.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Friday, August 1st. The basic materials company reported $4.09 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.03 by $0.06. Linde had a net margin of 20.20% and a return on equity of 19.09%. The business had revenue of $8.50 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $8.35 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $3.85 earnings per share. The business’s quarterly revenue was up 2.3% on a year-over-year basis. Linde has set its FY 2025 guidance at 16.300-16.500 EPS. Q3 2025 guidance at 4.100-4.20 EPS. As a group, analysts predict that Linde PLC will post 16.54 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Linde Dividend Announcement

The company also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, September 18th. Investors of record on Thursday, September 4th will be given a dividend of $1.50 per share. This represents a $6.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.3%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, September 4th. Linde’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 42.67%.

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.