• Significant control over Meridian by individual investors implies that the general public has more power to influence management and governance-related decisions

  • The top 9 shareholders own 50% of the company

  • 13% of Meridian is held by insiders

A look at the shareholders of Meridian Corporation (NASDAQ:MRBK) can tell us which group is most powerful. We can see that individual investors own the lion’s share in the company with 30% ownership. In other words, the group stands to gain the most (or lose the most) from their investment into the company.

And hedge funds on the other hand have a 25% ownership in the company.

Let’s delve deeper into each type of owner of Meridian, beginning with the chart below.

View our latest analysis for Meridian

NasdaqGS:MRBK Ownership Breakdown December 19th 2024

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 Meridian does have institutional investors; and they hold a good portion of the company’s stock. 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 Meridian’s historic earnings and revenue below, but keep in mind there’s always more to the story.

earnings-and-revenue-growth
NasdaqGS:MRBK Earnings and Revenue Growth December 19th 2024

It would appear that 25% of Meridian shares are controlled by hedge funds. That worth noting, since hedge funds are often quite active investors, who may try to influence management. Many want to see value creation (and a higher share price) in the short term or medium term. Looking at our data, we can see that the largest shareholder is Fourthstone LLC with 10% of shares outstanding. For context, the second largest shareholder holds about 9.3% of the shares outstanding, followed by an ownership of 7.5% by the third-largest shareholder. In addition, we found that Christopher Annas, the CEO has 3.3% of the shares allocated to their name.

We did some more digging and found that 9 of the top shareholders account for roughly 50% of the register, implying that along with larger shareholders, there are a few smaller shareholders, thereby balancing out each others interests somewhat.