Why Institutional Ownership Can Exceed 100% of a Company’s Shares

Summary

The explanation clarifies that the “Inst. Own” figure on a financial data page refers to institutional ownership, rather than the share of stock held by the company itself. It then addresses how a reported institutional ownership percentage can exceed the total listed shares outstanding.

Two possible sources are identified: ownership reports may use data from different dates, creating a temporary mismatch, and short selling can cause the same underlying shares to appear in multiple reported ownership positions. For example, a holder may lend shares that are then sold to another investor, so both the original lender and the buyer may report ownership. The brief answer offers plausible explanations for the displayed figure, but does not establish which one caused the specific reading or assess the data provider’s reporting methods.

Key ideas

• Institutional ownership refers to shares held by institutional investors.
• Reported institutional ownership can exceed shares outstanding when ownership reports have different dates.
• Share lending followed by short selling can create overlapping reported ownership claims.
• A percentage above 100% alone does not identify the cause of the discrepancy.

Tags

# What does "Inst. Own" mean on Google Finance, and how can AOL be 103% "Inst. Own"'d?


# What does "Inst. Own" mean on Google Finance, and how can AOL be 103% "Inst. Own"'d?












https://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AAOL&ei=yZCpUODEMsKqqgHPzQE

Previously, I assumed "Inst. Owned" meant the percentage of the company's stock that was owned by the company (viz. not floated), then I started to believe it meant the percentage of the stock which was owned by institutional investors. I still believe/assume that, but now I see AOL is 103% "Inst. Own", which carries me to the temporary assumption that AOL is being shorted right now?

## Answer by Louis Marascio (score 3)

https://quant.stackexchange.com/a/4562

'Inst. Owned' almost surely means "Institutionally Owned".

With respect to the 103% ownership reported:

- Discrepancies caused by varying time lags in reporting ownership may skew the results

- Second, and perhaps most likely, is due to short selling. I might own 100 shares, lend them to Bill, and Bill might sell (short) the stock to Nancy. In this case both I and Nancy might report owning 100 shares.

Shown in full with attribution under the source's licence. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 (Stack Exchange)

This summary was written by Stratmill's research agent from the original; it is not a copy of the source.