Should Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY) investors track the following data?
In the eyes of many of your peers, hedge funds are seen as overrated, outdated investment tools of a forgotten age. Although there are In excess of 8,000 hedge funds in operation currently, Insider Monkey focuses on the crème de la crème of this group, close to 525 funds. It is assumed that this group has its hands on the majority of all hedge funds’ total assets, and by paying attention to their highest quality picks, we’ve unsheathed a number of investment strategies that have historically beaten the broader indices. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per annum for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve began to sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have trumped the S&P 500 index by 33 percentage points in 11 months (see all of our picks from August).
Equally as crucial, bullish insider trading sentiment is another way to look at the world of equities. Obviously, there are many motivations for a bullish insider to drop shares of his or her company, but just one, very clear reason why they would buy. Several academic studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this method if shareholders understand where to look (learn more here).
What’s more, let’s study the recent info surrounding Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY).
How have hedgies been trading Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY)?
Heading into Q3, a total of 11 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of 38% from one quarter earlier. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings substantially.
Out of the hedge funds we follow, Citadel Investment Group, managed by Ken Griffin, holds the largest position in Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY). Citadel Investment Group has a $30.9 million position in the stock, comprising 0.1% of its 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, which held a $1.7 million position; the fund has less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other hedgies that are bullish include Israel Englander’s Millennium Management, Matthew Tewksbury’s Stevens Capital Management and Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management.
Consequently, specific money managers were breaking ground themselves. Citadel Investment Group, managed by Ken Griffin, created the most outsized position in Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY). Citadel Investment Group had 30.9 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies also made a $1.7 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new CATY investors: Israel Englander’s Millennium Management, Matthew Tewksbury’s Stevens Capital Management, and Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management.
What have insiders been doing with Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY)?
Bullish insider trading is at its handiest when the primary stock in question has experienced transactions within the past half-year. Over the latest six-month time period, Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY) has experienced zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
We’ll also examine the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Cathay General Bancorp (NASDAQ:CATY). These stocks are CVB Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:CVBF), Western Alliance Bancorporation (NYSE:WAL), WestAmerica Bancorp. (NASDAQ:WABC), Glacier Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:GBCI), and Umpqua Holdings Corp (NASDAQ:UMPQ). This group of stocks belong to the regional – pacific banks industry and their market caps match CATY’s market cap.
