Key Insights

• Insiders appear to have a vested interest in Tempus AI's growth, as seen by their sizeable ownership
• The top 4 shareholders own 54% of the company
• Insiders have sold recently

If you want to know who really controls Tempus AI, Inc (NASDAQ:TEM), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. With 36% stake, individual insiders possess the maximum shares in the company. Put another way, the group faces the maximum upside potential (or downside risk).

Even though insiders have sold shares recently, the group owns the most numbers of shares in the company. As a result, the group bore the brunt of last week’s US$1.5b market cap loss.

Let's delve deeper into each type of owner of Tempus AI, beginning with the chart below.

View our latest analysis for Tempus AI

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Tempus AI?

Institutions typically measure themselves against a benchmark when reporting to their own investors, so they often become more enthusiastic about a stock once it's included in a major index. We would expect most companies to have some institutions on the register, especially if they are growing.

We can see that Tempus AI 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. 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 Tempus AI's historic earnings and revenue below, but keep in mind there's always more to the story.

Hedge funds don't have many shares in Tempus AI. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is the CEO Eric Lefkofsky with 24% of shares outstanding. The second and third largest shareholders are BK TL21 LLC and Kimberly Keywell, with an equal amount of shares to their name at 11%.

On looking further, we found that 54% of the shares are owned by the top 4 shareholders. In other words, these shareholders have a meaningful say in the decisions of the company.

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. Quite a few analysts cover the stock, so you could look into forecast growth quite easily.

Insider Ownership Of Tempus AI

While the precise definition of an insider can be subjective, almost everyone considers board members to be insiders. Management ultimately answers to the board. However, it is not uncommon for managers to be executive board members, especially if they are a founder or the CEO.

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.

It seems insiders own a significant proportion of Tempus AI, Inc. It is very interesting to see that insiders have a meaningful US$2.4b stake in this US$6.6b business. Most would be pleased to see the board is investing alongside them. You may wish to access this free chart showing recent trading by insiders.

General Public Ownership

The general public, who are usually individual investors, hold a 11% stake in Tempus AI. 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.

Private Company Ownership

Our data indicates that Private Companies hold 17%, of the company's shares. It might be worth looking deeper into this. If related parties, such as insiders, have an interest in one of these private companies, that should be disclosed in the annual report. Private companies may also have a strategic interest in the company.

Next Steps:

While it is well worth considering the different groups that own a company, there are other factors that are even more important. To that end, you should learn about the 3 warning signs we've spotted with Tempus AI (including 1 which can't be ignored) .

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.