Harte-Hanks, Inc. (NYSE:HHS), Millennial Media, Inc. (NYSE:MM): Hedge Funds Are Crazy About National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI)

National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) was in 15 hedge funds’ portfolio at the end of the fourth quarter of 2012. NCMI investors should pay attention to an increase in support from the world’s most elite money managers recently. There were 14 hedge funds in our database with NCMI holdings at the end of the previous quarter.

In the financial world, there are a multitude of methods investors can use to analyze stocks. A duo of the best are hedge fund and insider trading interest. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the top investment managers can trounce the S&P 500 by a very impressive margin (see just how much).

Just as beneficial, bullish insider trading sentiment is a second way to parse down the world of equities. Just as you’d expect, there are lots of incentives for an insider to cut shares of his or her company, but only one, very simple reason why they would behave bullishly. Many empirical studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this method if piggybackers know what to do (learn more here).

Keeping this in mind, let’s take a glance at the latest action encompassing National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI).

What does the smart money think about National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI)?

Heading into 2013, a total of 15 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of 7% from the previous quarter. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists an “upper tier” of key hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings substantially.

Of the funds we track, Wallace Weitz’s Wallace R. Weitz & Co. had the largest position in National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI), worth close to $28 million, accounting for 1.2% of its total 13F portfolio. Coming in second is Dorsal Capital Management, managed by Ryan Frick and Oliver Evans, which held a $16 million position; 0.2% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Other hedge funds that are bullish include Charles Clough’s Clough Capital Partners, Eric Bannasch’s Cadian Capital and Geoffrey Raynor’s Q Investments (Specter Holdings).

As aggregate interest increased, some big names have been driving this bullishness. Clough Capital Partners, managed by Charles Clough, assembled the largest position in National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI). Clough Capital Partners had 5 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Israel Englander’s Millennium Management also initiated a $0 million position during the quarter. The other funds with new positions in the stock are Mike Vranos’s Ellington and Steven Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors.

What do corporate executives and insiders think about National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI)?

Bullish insider trading is most useful when the company in question has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the last 180-day time frame, National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) has seen zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s check out hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI). These stocks are Harte-Hanks, Inc. (NYSE:HHS), Millennial Media, Inc. (NYSE:MM), MDC Partners Inc. (USA) (NASDAQ:MDCA), Arbitron Inc. (NYSE:ARB), and Valassis Communications, Inc. (NYSE:VCI). This group of stocks are the members of the marketing services industry and their market caps match NCMI’s market cap.

With the returns shown by Insider Monkey’s tactics, retail investors must always keep an eye on hedge fund and insider trading activity, and National CineMedia, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCMI) is an important part of this process.