Key Insights

• Insiders appear to have a vested interest in Celtic's growth, as seen by their sizeable ownership

• A total of 2 investors have a majority stake in the company with 53% ownership

• Institutional ownership in Celtic is 23%

If you want to know who really controls Celtic plc (LON:CCP), then you'll have to look at the makeup of its share registry. The group holding the most number of shares in the company, around 58% to be precise, is individual insiders. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

So it follows, every decision made by insiders of Celtic regarding the company's future would be crucial to them.

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

See our latest analysis for Celtic

What Does The Institutional Ownership Tell Us About Celtic?

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.

As you can see, institutional investors have a fair amount of stake in Celtic. This can indicate that the company has a certain degree of credibility in the investment community. However, it is best to be wary of relying on the supposed validation that comes with institutional investors. They too, get it wrong sometimes. 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 Celtic'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 Celtic. Dermot Desmond is currently the largest shareholder, with 35% of shares outstanding. With 19% and 13% of the shares outstanding respectively, Lindsell Train Limited and Christopher Trainer are the second and third largest shareholders.

After doing some more digging, we found that the top 2 shareholders collectively control more than half of the company's shares, implying that they have considerable power to influence the company's decisions.

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. While there is some analyst coverage, the company is probably not widely covered. So it could gain more attention, down the track.