Do Hedge Funds and Insiders Love GrafTech International Ltd (GTI)?

At the moment, there are many gauges shareholders can use to analyze Mr. Market. A pair of the best are hedge fund and insider trading sentiment. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the top hedge fund managers can trounce the S&P 500 by a superb amount (see just how much).

Equally as key, positive insider trading sentiment is another way to look at the marketplace. As the old adage goes: there are a variety of stimuli for an executive to get rid of shares of his or her company, but just one, very clear reason why they would buy. Many empirical studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this strategy if piggybackers understand what to do (learn more here).

What’s more, let’s analyze the latest info for GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI).

How are hedge funds trading GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI)?

At Q2’s end, a total of 12 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of -25% from the first quarter. With the smart money’s positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists an “upper tier” of notable hedge fund managers who were increasing their holdings substantially.

When using filings from the hedgies we track, Royce & Associates, managed by Chuck Royce, holds the most valuable position in GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI). Royce & Associates has a $127 million position in the stock, comprising 0.4% of its 13F portfolio. On Royce & Associates’s heels is Samlyn Capital, managed by Robert Pohly, which held a $42.8 million position; the fund has 1.2% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining peers that hold long positions include Mario Gabelli’s GAMCO Investors, D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw and John Overdeck and David Siegel’s Two Sigma Advisors.

Since GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI) has experienced a fall in interest from the smart money’s best and brightest, logic holds that there was a specific group of money managers that elected to cut their entire stakes at the end of the second quarter. At the top of the heap, Neil Chriss’s Hutchin Hill Capital dumped the largest stake of all the hedgies we track, comprising close to $2 million in stock. Paul Tudor Jones’s fund, Tudor Investment Corp, also dumped its stock, about $0.2 million worth. These bearish behaviors are important to note, as aggregate hedge fund interest fell by 4 funds at the end of the second quarter.

What have insiders been doing with GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI)?

Legal insider trading, particularly when it’s bullish, is at its handiest when the company in question has seen transactions within the past half-year. Over the last six-month time frame, GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI) has seen 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 GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI). These stocks are Franklin Electric Co. (NASDAQ:FELE), Hollysys Automation Technologies Ltd (NASDAQ:HOLI), Littelfuse, Inc. (NASDAQ:LFUS), Altra Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:AIMC), and OSI Systems, Inc. (NASDAQ:OSIS). This group of stocks are the members of the industrial electrical equipment industry and their market caps are similar to GTI’s market cap.

Using the returns shown by the previously mentioned strategies, regular investors must always track hedge fund and insider trading activity, and GrafTech International Ltd (NYSE:GTI) is no exception.

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