Do Hedge Funds and Insiders Love Moody’s Corporation (MCO)?

Is Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO) a buy?

In the financial world, there are many metrics investors can use to watch stocks. Two of the most underrated are hedge fund and insider trading interest. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the elite money managers can trounce the S&P 500 by a very impressive margin (see just how much).

Equally as useful, positive insider trading sentiment is a second way to look at the marketplace. Just as you’d expect, there are many motivations for a corporate insider to sell shares of his or her company, but only one, very clear reason why they would behave bullishly. Plenty of academic studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this strategy if you understand where to look (learn more here).

Thus, we’re going to study the newest info about Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO).

What have hedge funds been doing with Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO)?

At the end of the second quarter, a total of 35 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of -8% from one quarter earlier. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes meaningfully.

According to our 13F database, Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway had the most valuable position in Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO), worth close to $1.5185 billion, accounting for 1.7% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Chris Hohn of Childrens Investment Fund, with a $474.6 million position; 27.2% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Remaining peers with similar optimism include Charles Akre’s Akre Capital Management, Lou Simpson’s SQ Advisors and Rob Butts and Josh Clark’s Southpoint Capital Advisors.

Because Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO) has witnessed dropping sentiment from the top-tier hedge fund industry, logic holds that there was a specific group of hedgies that elected to cut their positions entirely in Q1. Intriguingly, Robert Joseph Caruso’s Select Equity Group dropped the biggest position of the 450+ funds we watch, worth close to $43.6 million in stock. Eric Chen’s fund, Antipodean Advisors, also dropped its stock, about $36 million worth. These transactions are intriguing to say the least, as aggregate hedge fund interest was cut by 3 funds in Q1.

How have insiders been trading Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO)?

Insider buying made by high-level executives is most useful when the company in focus has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the latest half-year time period, Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO) has seen 1 unique insiders purchasing, and 8 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

We’ll also review the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Moody’s Corporation (NYSE:MCO). These stocks are FleetCor Technologies, Inc. (NYSE:FLT), Alliance Data Systems Corporation (NYSE:ADS), Verisk Analytics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSK), Fidelity National Information Services (NYSE:FIS), and Fiserv, Inc. (NASDAQ:FISV). This group of stocks are in the business services industry and their market caps match MCO’s market cap.