Do Hedge Funds Love Hemisphere Media Group Inc (HMTV)?

The latest 13F reporting period has come and gone, and Insider Monkey is again at the forefront when it comes to making use of this gold mine of data. We at Insider Monkey have plowed through 821 13F filings that hedge funds and well-known value investors are required to file by the SEC. The 13F filings show the funds’ and investors’ portfolio positions as of March 31st, a week after the market trough. In this article we look at what those investors think of Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV).

Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV) was in 9 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of March. HMTV investors should be aware of an increase in enthusiasm from smart money in recent months. There were 8 hedge funds in our database with HMTV holdings at the end of the previous quarter. Our calculations also showed that HMTV isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q1 rankings and see the video for a quick look at the top 5 stocks).

Video: Watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.

Why do we pay any attention at all to hedge fund sentiment? Our research has shown that a select group of hedge fund holdings outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by 58 percentage points since March 2017 (see the details here). We were also able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that’ll significantly underperform the market. We have been tracking and sharing the list of these stocks since February 2017 and they lost 36% through May 18th. That’s why we believe hedge fund sentiment is an extremely useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.

William Graves of Boardman Bay Capital Management

At Insider Monkey we leave no stone unturned when looking for the next great investment idea. For example, We take a look at lists like the 10 most profitable companies in the world to identify the compounders that are likely to deliver double digit returns. We interview hedge fund managers and ask them about their best ideas. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. For example we are checking out stocks recommended/scorned by legendary Bill Miller. Our best call in 2020 was shorting the market when the S&P 500 was trading at 3150 in February after realizing the coronavirus pandemic’s significance before most investors. Keeping this in mind we’re going to take a gander at the recent hedge fund action encompassing Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV).

What does smart money think about Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV)?

At the end of the first quarter, a total of 9 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 13% from one quarter earlier. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards HMTV over the last 18 quarters. So, let’s find out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

Of the funds tracked by Insider Monkey, Fine Capital Partners, managed by Debra Fine, holds the number one position in Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV). Fine Capital Partners has a $17.5 million position in the stock, comprising 10.6% of its 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is Renaissance Technologies, with a $7.1 million position; the fund has less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining peers with similar optimism comprise Will Graves’s Boardman Bay Capital Management, David Harding’s Winton Capital Management and D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Fine Capital Partners allocated the biggest weight to Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV), around 10.65% of its 13F portfolio. Boardman Bay Capital Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, earmarking 0.93 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to HMTV.

Consequently, specific money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. Citadel Investment Group, managed by Ken Griffin, established the most valuable position in Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV). Citadel Investment Group had $0.1 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter.

Let’s now take a look at hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV). We will take a look at SI-BONE, Inc. (NASDAQ:SIBN), Voyager Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:VYGR), Triple-S Management Corp.(NYSE:GTS), and Century Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:CNBKA). This group of stocks’ market caps resemble HMTV’s market cap.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 12.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $59 million. That figure was $26 million in HMTV’s case. SI-BONE, Inc. (NASDAQ:SIBN) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Century Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:CNBKA) is the least popular one with only 4 bullish hedge fund positions. Hemisphere Media Group Inc (NASDAQ:HMTV) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. Our calculations showed that top 10 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 41.4% in 2019 and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 10.1 percentage points. These stocks gained 13.4% in 2020 through June 22nd and surpassed the market by 15.9 percentage points. Unfortunately HMTV wasn’t nearly as popular as these 10 stocks (hedge fund sentiment was quite bearish); HMTV investors were disappointed as the stock returned 8.7% during the second quarter and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 10 most popular stocks among hedge funds as most of these stocks already outperformed the market in 2020.

Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.