Is it smart to be bullish on Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY)?
Now, according to many investors, hedge funds are assumed to be bloated, outdated investment vehicles of a forgotten age. Although there are In excess of 8,000 hedge funds with their doors open today, Insider Monkey aim at the crème de la crème of this club, close to 525 funds. Analysts calculate that this group has its hands on most of the smart money’s total assets, and by monitoring their highest performing equity investments, we’ve deciphered a number of investment strategies that have historically outstripped the market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy outstripped the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per annum for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve started sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have outperformed the S&P 500 index by 33 percentage points in 11 months (find the details here).
Equally as key, optimistic insider trading activity is a second way to look at the world of equities. Just as you’d expect, there are many reasons for an executive to sell shares of his or her company, but only one, very clear reason why they would initiate a purchase. Many academic studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this method if you understand what to do (learn more here).
Now that that’s out of the way, we’re going to analyze the recent info for Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY).
How are hedge funds trading Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY)?
In preparation for the third quarter, a total of 7 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of 0% from the first quarter. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists an “upper tier” of notable hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes substantially.
According to our 13F database, Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group had the biggest position in Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY), worth close to $6.8 million, comprising less than 0.1%% of its total 13F portfolio. On Citadel Investment Group’s heels is D. E. Shaw of D E Shaw, with a $1.8 million position; less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Remaining hedge funds that are bullish include Greg Poole’s Echo Street Capital Management, David Harding’s Winton Capital Management and Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management.
Because Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY) has experienced a fall in interest from upper-tier hedge fund managers, we can see that there exists a select few hedgies who were dropping their positions entirely at the end of the second quarter. Interestingly, Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management said goodbye to the biggest position of all the hedgies we key on, valued at about $1.8 million in stock. Israel Englander’s fund, Millennium Management, also said goodbye to its stock, about $0.7 million worth. These transactions are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).
How have insiders been trading Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY)?
Bullish insider trading is particularly usable when the primary stock in question has seen transactions within the past 180 days. Over the latest half-year time period, Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY) has experienced zero unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
We’ll also take a look at the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Equity One, Inc. (NYSE:EQY). These stocks are Weingarten Realty Investors (NYSE:WRI), CBL & Associates Properties, Inc. (NYSE:CBL), Hospitality Properties Trust (NYSE:HPT), Tanger Factory Outlet Centers Inc. (NYSE:SKT), and EPR Properties (NYSE:EPR). This group of stocks are in the reit – retail industry and their market caps match EQY’s market cap.
