Key Insights

• Hong Kong Technology Venture's significant individual investors ownership suggests that the key decisions are influenced by shareholders from the larger public
• The top 5 shareholders own 50% of the company
• Past performance of a company along with ownership data serve to give a strong idea about prospects for a business

If you want to know who really controls Hong Kong Technology Venture Company Limited (HKG:1137), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 46% to be precise, is individual investors. That is, the group stands to benefit the most if the stock rises (or lose the most if there is a downturn).

As a result, individual investors as a group endured the highest losses last week after market cap fell by HK$418m.

In the chart below, we zoom in on the different ownership groups of Hong Kong Technology Venture.

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Hong Kong Technology Venture?

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.

We can see that Hong Kong Technology Venture does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. 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. 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 Hong Kong Technology Venture, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

Hong Kong Technology Venture is not owned by hedge funds. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is Top Group International Limited with 40% of shares outstanding. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 3.0% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 2.8% by the third-largest shareholder. Chi Kin Cheung, who is the second-largest shareholder, also happens to hold the title of Top Key Executive.

To make our study more interesting, we found that the top 5 shareholders control more than half of the company which implies that this group has considerable sway over the company's decision-making.

Researching institutional ownership is a good way to gauge and filter a stock's expected performance. The same can be achieved by studying analyst sentiments. There is some analyst coverage of the stock, but it could still become more well known, with time.

Insider Ownership Of Hong Kong Technology Venture

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. The company management answer to the board and the latter should represent the interests of shareholders. Notably, sometimes top-level managers are on the board themselves.

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.

We can see that insiders own shares in Hong Kong Technology Venture Company Limited. In their own names, insiders own HK$42m worth of stock in the HK$1.4b company. It is good to see some investment by insiders, but we usually like to see higher insider holdings. It might be worth checking if those insiders have been buying.

General Public Ownership

With a 46% ownership, the general public, mostly comprising of individual investors, have some degree of sway over Hong Kong Technology Venture. While this group can't necessarily call the shots, it can certainly have a real influence on how the company is run.

Private Company Ownership

Our data indicates that Private Companies hold 43%, of the company's shares. It's hard to draw any conclusions from this fact alone, so its worth looking into who owns those private companies. Sometimes insiders or other related parties have an interest in shares in a public company through a separate private company.

Next Steps:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Hong Kong Technology Venture better, we need to consider many other factors. Be aware that Hong Kong Technology Venture is showing 1 warning sign in our investment analysis , you should know about...

Ultimately the future is most important. You can access this free report on analyst forecasts for the company.

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.

Have feedback on this article? Concerned about the content? Get in touch with us directly. Alternatively, email editorial-team@simplywallst.com