Do Hedge Funds and Insiders Love Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (WYN)?

Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:WYN) investors should be aware of a decrease in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds lately; stagnancy is a negative development in our experience.

To most market participants, hedge funds are viewed as slow, old financial vehicles of yesteryear. While there are over 8000 funds trading today, we hone in on the leaders of this group, close to 450 funds. It is widely believed that this group oversees the lion’s share of the hedge fund industry’s total asset base, and by paying attention to their highest performing stock picks, we have deciphered a number of investment strategies that have historically beaten Mr. Market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points a year 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 beaten the S&P 500 index by 23.3 percentage points in 8 months (explore the details and some picks here).

Just as integral, positive insider trading activity is another way to parse down 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 simple reason why they would behave bullishly. Many empirical studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this strategy if “monkeys” understand where to look (learn more here).

Keeping this in mind, it’s important to take a glance at the key action encompassing Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:WYN).

Hedge fund activity in Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:WYN)

In preparation for this quarter, a total of 33 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 0% from one quarter earlier.

Since Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:WYN) has faced stagnant interest from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, it’s safe to say that there is a sect of hedge funds that elected to cut their full holdings in Q1. Interestingly, Larry Foley and Paul Farrell’s Bronson Point Partners cut the largest stake of the “upper crust” of funds we monitor, totaling close to $13.3 million in stock.. Daniel Arbess’s fund, Xerion, also dropped its stock, about $8.7 million worth. These moves are important to note, as total hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).

What have insiders been doing with Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:WYN)?

Insider trading activity, especially when it’s bullish, is best served when the company in question has experienced transactions within the past 180 days. Over the last 180-day time period, Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:WYN) has experienced zero unique insiders buying, and 9 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 Wyndham Worldwide Corporation (NYSE:WYN). These stocks are Marriott International Inc (NYSE:MAR), Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide, Inc (NYSE:HOT), Hyatt Hotels Corporation (NYSE:H), Expedia Inc (NASDAQ:EXPE), and InterContinental Hotels Group PLC (ADR) (NYSE:IHG). This group of stocks are in the lodging industry and their market caps are similar to WYN’s market cap.