Linde (NASDAQ:LIN) Releases FY24 Earnings Guidance

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

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several research firms have recently weighed in on LIN. UBS Group cut Linde from a buy rating to a neutral rating and increased their price target for the company from $482.00 to $510.00 in a report on Wednesday, March 27th. Stifel Nicolaus cut Linde from a buy rating to a hold rating and set a $429.00 target price on the stock. in a report on Monday, January 22nd. Citigroup cut Linde from a buy rating to a neutral rating and raised their target price for the stock from $475.00 to $500.00 in a report on Wednesday, April 10th. Mizuho raised their target price on Linde from $510.00 to $512.00 and gave the stock a buy rating in a report on Friday. Finally, TD Cowen raised their target price on Linde from $395.00 to $455.00 and gave the stock a market perform rating in a report on Friday, February 16th. Six investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and seven have assigned a buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the company presently has an average rating of Moderate Buy and an average price target of $460.15.

Linde Price Performance

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

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

Linde Dividend Announcement

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

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, VP Juergen Nowicki sold 13,134 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $459.14, for a total transaction of $6,030,344.76. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now owns 6,920 shares in the company, valued at $3,177,248.80. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. In other news, VP Juergen Nowicki sold 13,134 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $459.14, for a total transaction of $6,030,344.76. Following the completion of the transaction, the vice president now owns 6,920 shares in the company, valued at $3,177,248.80. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at the SEC website. Also, VP Sean Durbin sold 5,277 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, March 12th. The shares were sold at an average price of $467.39, for a total value of $2,466,417.03. Following the transaction, the vice president now owns 8,151 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $3,809,695.89. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders sold 78,248 shares of company stock worth $35,811,988. Corporate insiders own 0.70% of the company’s stock.

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.