Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) Issues FY24 Earnings Guidance

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) updated its FY24 earnings guidance on Thursday. The company provided EPS guidance of $15.30-15.60 for the period, compared to the consensus EPS estimate of $15.41.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several research firms have recently issued reports on LIN. Mizuho lifted their price target on Linde from $510.00 to $512.00 and gave the stock a buy rating in a research report on Friday. TD Cowen raised their price target on shares of Linde from $395.00 to $455.00 and gave the company a market perform rating in a report on Friday, February 16th. Seaport Res Ptn downgraded shares of Linde from a buy rating to a neutral rating in a report on Monday, January 8th. Stifel Nicolaus downgraded shares of Linde from a buy rating to a hold rating and set a $429.00 price target on the stock. in a report on Monday, January 22nd. Finally, UBS Group downgraded shares of Linde from a buy rating to a neutral rating and raised their price target for the company from $482.00 to $510.00 in a report on Wednesday, March 27th. Six equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have given a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, the company currently has a consensus rating of Moderate Buy and an average target price of $460.15.

Linde Price Performance

LIN traded up $3.98 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $423.60. The company’s stock had a trading volume of 2,657,419 shares, compared to its average volume of 1,803,659. The business’s 50-day moving average price is $455.47 and its 200-day moving average price is $422.69. Linde has a 12 month low of $350.60 and a 12 month high of $477.71. The stock has a market cap of $204.00 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 32.86, a P/E/G ratio of 2.78 and a beta of 0.94. The company has a current ratio of 0.91, a quick ratio of 0.67 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.38.

Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, May 2nd. The basic materials company reported $3.75 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.68 by $0.07. The company had revenue of $8.10 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $8.38 billion. Linde had a net margin of 19.26% and a return on equity of 17.49%. Linde’s quarterly revenue was down 1.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $3.42 earnings per share. Sell-side analysts expect that Linde will post 15.5 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Linde Announces Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Tuesday, June 18th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, June 4th will be paid a dividend of $1.39 per share. This represents a $5.56 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.31%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, June 4th. Linde’s payout ratio is 43.13%.

Insider Activity

In other news, SVP Oliver Pfann sold 300 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $414.61, for a total transaction of $124,383.00. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In related news, VP Sean Durbin sold 5,277 shares of Linde stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 12th. The stock was sold at an average price of $467.39, for a total value of $2,466,417.03. Following the completion of the sale, the vice president now directly owns 8,151 shares in the company, valued at $3,809,695.89. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, SVP Oliver Pfann sold 300 shares of Linde stock in a transaction dated Thursday, February 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $414.61, for a total value of $124,383.00. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 78,248 shares of company stock valued at $35,811,988. 0.70% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Linde Company Profile

Linde plc operates as an industrial gas company in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and South Pacific. It offers atmospheric gases, including oxygen, nitrogen, argon, and rare gases; and process gases, such as carbon dioxide, helium, hydrogen, electronic gases, specialty gases, and acetylene.