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• Significant insider control over Pan-United implies vested interests in company growth

• The top 3 shareholders own 64% of the company

• Recent sales by insiders

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If you want to know who really controls Pan-United Corporation Ltd (SGX:P52), then you’ll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. And the group that holds the biggest piece of the pie are individual insiders with 72% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

And insiders own the top position in the company’s share registry despite recent sales.

Let’s take a closer look to see what the different types of shareholders can tell us about Pan-United.

View our latest analysis for Pan-United

Small companies that are not very actively traded often lack institutional investors, but it’s less common to see large companies without them.

There could be various reasons why no institutions own shares in a company. Typically, small, newly listed companies don’t attract much attention from fund managers, because it would not be possible for large fund managers to build a meaningful position in the company. It is also possible that fund managers don’t own the stock because they aren’t convinced it will perform well. Pan-United might not have the sort of past performance institutions are looking for, or perhaps they simply have not studied the business closely.

Hedge funds don’t have many shares in Pan-United. The company’s largest shareholder is Han Whatt Ng, with ownership of 23%. The second and third largest shareholders are Bee Kiok Ng and Bee Bee Ng, with an equal amount of shares to their name at 21%. Bee Bee Ng, who is the third-largest shareholder, also happens to hold the title of Chairman of the Board.

To make our study more interesting, we found that the top 3 shareholders have a majority ownership in the company, meaning that they are powerful enough to influence the decisions of 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 plenty of analysts covering the stock, so it might be worth seeing what they are forecasting, too.

The definition of company insiders can be subjective and does vary between jurisdictions. Our data reflects individual insiders, capturing board members at the very least. 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.

It seems that insiders own more than half the Pan-United Corporation Ltd stock. This gives them a lot of power. Given it has a market cap of S$824m, that means they have S$594m worth of shares. It is good to see this level of investment. You can check here to see if those insiders have been buying recently.

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 27% stake in Pan-United. 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.

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. For instance, we’ve identified 2 warning signs for Pan-United that you should be aware of.

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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This article by Simply Wall St is general in nature. We provide commentary based on historical data and analyst forecasts only using an unbiased methodology and our articles are not intended to be financial advice. It does not constitute a recommendation to buy or sell any stock, and does not take account of your objectives, or your financial situation. We aim to bring you long-term focused analysis driven by fundamental data. Note that our analysis may not factor in the latest price-sensitive company announcements or qualitative material. Simply Wall St has no position in any stocks mentioned.