Do Hedge Funds and Insiders Love Douglas Dynamics Inc (PLOW)?

Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW) has seen a decrease in support from the world’s most elite money managers in recent months.

To the average investor, there are many metrics market participants can use to analyze their holdings. Two of the most underrated are hedge fund and insider trading activity. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the elite hedge fund managers can outperform the broader indices by a solid amount (see just how much).

Just as beneficial, positive insider trading sentiment is a second way to parse down the stock market universe. Just as you’d expect, there are lots of incentives for an upper level exec to cut shares of his or her company, but just one, very simple reason why they would behave bullishly. Various academic studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this tactic if shareholders understand where to look (learn more here).

With all of this in mind, we’re going to take a glance at the key action regarding Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW).

What does the smart money think about Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW)?

At the end of the first quarter, a total of 6 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 0% from the first quarter. With hedge funds’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists an “upper tier” of key hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly.

When looking at the hedgies we track, Citadel Investment Group, managed by Ken Griffin, holds the most valuable position in Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW). Citadel Investment Group has a $0.7 million position in the stock, comprising less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Chuck Royce of Royce & Associates, with a $0.7 million position; the fund has less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining peers that are bullish include Matthew Hulsizer’s PEAK6 Capital Management, Gregory Fraser, Rudolph Kluiber, and Timothy Krochuk’s GRT Capital Partners and John Overdeck and David Siegel’s Two Sigma Advisors.

Since Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW) has faced declining sentiment from hedge fund managers, we can see that there was a specific group of funds that elected to cut their entire stakes heading into Q2. Interestingly, D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw dropped the biggest position of the 450+ funds we track, valued at close to $0.3 million in stock.. Paul Tudor Jones’s fund, Tudor Investment Corp, also said goodbye to its stock, about $0.2 million worth. These moves are important to note, as total hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).

Insider trading activity in Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW)

Insider trading activity, especially when it’s bullish, is most useful when the company in question has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the latest six-month time period, Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW) has seen zero unique insiders buying, and 4 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also take a look at hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW). These stocks are Superior Industries International Inc. (NYSE:SUP), Meritor Inc (NYSE:MTOR), Stoneridge, Inc. (NYSE:SRI), Modine Manufacturing Co. (NYSE:MOD), and Fuel Systems Solutions, Inc. (NASDAQ:FSYS). All of these stocks are in the auto parts industry and their market caps resemble PLOW’s market cap.

With the results demonstrated by our studies, retail investors should always keep an eye on hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Douglas Dynamics Inc (NYSE:PLOW) shareholders fit into this picture quite nicely.

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