At The Motley Fool, we like companies with a high level of insider ownership. We believe that leaders with large ownership stakes in their companies will have a greater incentive to do what's best for the business. The record appears to bear this theory out, since such companies tend to outperform.

Compare the performance of Garmin (NASDAQ:GRMN) (41% insider-owned) to that of golden-parachute-burdened Home Depot (NYSE:HD) (1% insider-owned). One has been a double over the past five years, while the other has done ... not so well. I’ll let you guess which is which.

With all of this in mind, I used our new CAPS screening tool to look for companies with high insider ownership. Below, you'll find five companies whose insiders hold at least 20% of shares.

They also have:

  • Market caps greater than $150 million.
  • Five-star ratings, the highest possible, from our CAPS community.

Remember, in the first year for which we have data, five-star companies outperformed with an average return of nearly 28%.

Company

Share Price

Sector

Market Cap

Fuel Tech (NASDAQ:FTEK)

$24.13

Industrial Goods

$542 million

IPG Photonics (NASDAQ:IPGP)

$18.41

Technology

$815 million

Navios Maritime (NYSE:NM)

$10.28

Services

$1.1 billion

Steel Dynamics (NASDAQ:STLD)

$37.77

Basic Materials

$7.1 billion

ShengaTech (NASDAQ:SDTH)                           

$7.74

Basic Materials

$419 million

Data from Motley Fool CAPS and Yahoo! Finance as of June 10.

Of course, this screen is only a starting point in the research process. Come and join us on Motley Fool CAPS to dig into these companies further. Let our 105,000-strong (and counting) CAPS community help you make better stock selections.

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