Linde plc (LIN)

Linde produces industrial gases — a business of long contracts and near-guaranteed utilisation.

Oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen and argon are needed by metallurgy, chemicals, electronics, healthcare and food processing. The defining feature of the model: a plant is built on the customer's own site under a ten- to twenty-year take-or-pay contract — the customer pays whether or not it lifts the volume.

That gives unusual predictability for an industrial company: revenue barely tracks the current cycle, and higher energy costs are passed to the customer under the contract. Transporting gases is expensive, so markets are local and competition is limited to a few players.

The growth direction is hydrogen and decarbonisation projects: the company supplies technology for hydrogen production and carbon capture. That is both growth and risk — some projects depend on government subsidies and on whether a hydrogen economy materialises at the announced scale. Linde raises its dividend consistently.