A whopping number of 13F filings filed with U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has been processed by Insider Monkey so that individual investors can look at the overall hedge fund sentiment towards the stocks included in their watchlists. These freshly-submitted public filings disclose money managers’ equity positions as of the end of the three-month period that ended September 30th, so let’s proceed with the discussion of the hedge fund sentiment on Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD).
Is Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD) a safe investment right now? Prominent investors were selling. The number of long hedge fund bets retreated by 8 recently. Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD) was in 32 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2021. The all time high for this statistic is 77. Our calculations also showed that APD isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings).
At Insider Monkey, we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, lithium prices have more than doubled over the past year, so we go through lists like the 10 best EV stocks to pick the next Tesla that will deliver a 10x return. Even though we recommend positions in only a tiny fraction of the companies we analyze, we check out as many stocks as we can. With all of this in mind let’s take a peek at the recent hedge fund action encompassing Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD).
Do Hedge Funds Think APD Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?
At Q3’s end, a total of 32 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of -20% from one quarter earlier. By comparison, 49 hedge funds held shares or bullish call options in APD a year ago. So, let’s find out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.
When looking at the institutional investors followed by Insider Monkey, Adage Capital Management, managed by Phill Gross and Robert Atchinson, holds the biggest position in Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD). Adage Capital Management has a $90.1 million position in the stock, comprising 0.2% of its 13F portfolio. On Adage Capital Management’s heels is Renaissance Technologies, with a $73.6 million position; 0.1% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Some other members of the smart money that are bullish contain Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management, Israel Englander’s Millennium Management and Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Bronson Point Partners allocated the biggest weight to Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD), around 6.72% of its 13F portfolio. MD Sass is also relatively very bullish on the stock, dishing out 3.82 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to APD.
Judging by the fact that Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD) has witnessed bearish sentiment from the aggregate hedge fund industry, it’s safe to say that there was a specific group of funds who sold off their positions entirely last quarter. Interestingly, Ray Dalio’s Bridgewater Associates dropped the largest investment of all the hedgies watched by Insider Monkey, comprising close to $23.1 million in stock. Jonathan Barrett and Paul Segal’s fund, Luminus Management, also cut its stock, about $14.8 million worth. These bearish behaviors are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest fell by 8 funds last quarter.
Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD) but similarly valued. These stocks are Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F), ING Groep N.V. (NYSE:ING), Twilio Inc. (NYSE:TWLO), Emerson Electric Co. (NYSE:EMR), CrowdStrike Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:CRWD), Relx PLC (NYSE:RELX), and UBS Group AG (NYSE:UBS). This group of stocks’ market values match APD’s market value.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| F | 51 | 1642491 | -4 |
| ING | 8 | 693351 | -1 |
| TWLO | 96 | 6369513 | -2 |
| EMR | 41 | 671007 | -4 |
| CRWD | 74 | 6742307 | 8 |
| RELX | 7 | 66312 | 1 |
| UBS | 15 | 166803 | 0 |
| Average | 41.7 | 2335969 | -0.3 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 41.7 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $2336 million. That figure was $529 million in APD’s case. Twilio Inc. (NYSE:TWLO) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Relx PLC (NYSE:RELX) is the least popular one with only 7 bullish hedge fund positions. Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for APD is 23.5. Stocks with higher number of hedge fund positions relative to other stocks as well as relative to their historical range receive a higher sentiment score. Our calculations showed that top 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 95.8% in 2019 and 2020, and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 40 percentage points. These stocks gained 28.6% in 2021 through November 30th and still beat the market by 5.6 percentage points. A small number of hedge funds were also right about betting on APD as the stock returned 12.2% since the end of the third quarter (through 11/30) and outperformed the market by an even larger margin.
Follow Air Products & Chemicals Inc. (NYSE:APD)
Follow Air Products & Chemicals Inc. (NYSE:APD)
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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
