Institutional investors in The Mosaic Company (NYSE:MOS) see US$1.3b decrease in market cap last week, although long-term gains have benefitted them. - Simply Wall St News

To get a sense of who is truly in control of The Mosaic Company (NYSE:MOS), 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 90% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

Losing money on investments is something no shareholder enjoys, least of all institutional investors who saw their holdings value drop by 7.2% last week. However, the 36% one-year return to shareholders may have helped lessen their pain. But they would probably be wary of future losses.

In the chart below, we zoom in on the different ownership groups of Mosaic.

Check out the opportunities and risks within the US Chemicals industry.

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Mosaic?

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.

Mosaic already has institutions on the share registry. Indeed, they own a respectable stake in 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 Mosaic's historic earnings and revenue below, but keep in mind there's always more to the story.

Since institutional investors own more than half the issued stock, the board will likely have to pay attention to their preferences. Hedge funds don't have many shares in Mosaic. The Vanguard Group, Inc. is currently the company's largest shareholder with 12% of shares outstanding. In comparison, the second and third largest shareholders hold about 8.2% and 6.8% of the stock.

Looking at the shareholder registry, we can see that 50% of the ownership is controlled by the top 14 shareholders, meaning that no single shareholder has a majority interest in the ownership.

While studying institutional ownership for a company can add value to your research, it is also a good practice to research analyst recommendations to get a deeper understand of a stock's expected performance. There are a reasonable number of analysts covering the stock, so it might be useful to find out their aggregate view on the future.

Insider Ownership Of Mosaic

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.

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 most recent data indicates that insiders own less than 1% of The Mosaic Company. Being so large, we would not expect insiders to own a large proportion of the stock. Collectively, they own US$60m of stock. Arguably recent buying and selling is just as important to consider. You can click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public-- including retail investors -- own 10% stake in the company, and hence can't easily be ignored. While this group can't necessarily call the shots, it can certainly have a real influence on how the company is run.

Next Steps:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Mosaic better, we need to consider many other factors. Consider risks, for instance. Every company has them, and we've spotted 1 warning sign for Mosaic you should know about.

If you would prefer discover what analysts are predicting in terms of future growth, do not miss this free report on analyst forecasts.

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.