Key Insights

• The considerable ownership by retail investors in Aurinia Pharmaceuticals indicates that they collectively have a greater say in management and business strategy
• The top 25 shareholders own 39% of the company
• Institutions own 40% of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals

To get a sense of who is truly in control of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals Inc. (NASDAQ:AUPH), it is important to understand the ownership structure of the business. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 52% to be precise, is retail investors. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

Institutions, on the other hand, account for 40% of the company's stockholders. Generally speaking, as a company grows, institutions will increase their ownership. Conversely, insiders often decrease their ownership over time.

Let's take a closer look to see what the different types of shareholders can tell us about Aurinia Pharmaceuticals.

See our latest analysis for Aurinia Pharmaceuticals

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Aurinia Pharmaceuticals?

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 Aurinia Pharmaceuticals does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company's stock. This suggests some credibility amongst professional investors. But we can't rely on that fact alone since institutions make bad investments sometimes, just like everyone does. 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 Aurinia Pharmaceuticals, (below). Of course, keep in mind that there are other factors to consider, too.

It would appear that 5.7% of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals shares are controlled by hedge funds. That's interesting, because hedge funds can be quite active and activist. Many look for medium term catalysts that will drive the share price higher. BlackRock, Inc. is currently the company's largest shareholder with 6.3% of shares outstanding. With 5.7% and 5.0% of the shares outstanding respectively, Armistice Capital LLC and Tang Capital Management, LLC are the second and third largest shareholders.

On studying our ownership data, we found that 25 of the top shareholders collectively own less than 50% of the share register, implying that no single individual has a majority interest.

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 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 Aurinia Pharmaceuticals

While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. 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.

We can see that insiders own shares in Aurinia Pharmaceuticals Inc.. It is a pretty big company, so it is generally a positive to see some potentially meaningful alignment. In this case, they own around US$19m worth of shares (at current prices). If you would like to explore the question of insider alignment, you can click here to see if insiders have been buying or selling.

General Public Ownership

The general public -- including retail investors -- own 52% of Aurinia Pharmaceuticals. This level of ownership gives investors from the wider public some power to sway key policy decisions such as board composition, executive compensation, and the dividend payout ratio.

Next Steps:

It's always worth thinking about the different groups who own shares in a company. But to understand Aurinia Pharmaceuticals better, we need to consider many other factors.

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.

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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.