Third Point Takes New Positions in Tech Stocks, Trims Earlier Losses (Reuters)
BOSTON (Reuters) – Daniel Loeb’s hedge fund Third Point LLC took new positions in technology companies including Alibaba (BABA.N) and Amazon (AMZN.O) and reported strong returns in the second quarter after he took back the reins as sole chief investment officer in May. The billionaire investor who founded Third Point a quarter century ago also told clients in a letter seen by Reuters that he bought a stake in The Walt Disney Co (DIS.N) where streaming services are creating the company’s “biggest market opportunity ever.”
How David Einhorn Is Betting on Higher Inflation (AI-CIO.com)
Inflation? What inflation? Hedge fund operator David Einhorn, who famously goes against the grain, is betting that the Consumer Price Index (CPI) will tick up in the US. Not a lot, mind you, but enough to give him a good result. Right now, inflation is muted. In the 12 months through mid-year, the CPI rose 0.6% after dipping 0.1% in May. To exploit what Einhorn sees as a more robust CPI ahead, his Greenlight Capital (assets: $7 billion) is taking positions in inflation swaps, which are derivatives based on Treasury inflation-protected securities (TIPS). His positions are in two-, five-, and 10-year swaps. In May, he wrote in a second-quarter letter to clients, those instruments implied annual CPI increases of just 0.1%, 0.8%, and 1.3%.
THE TRUE TIGER KING: Inside the Sprawling Web of Billionaire Julian Robertson, Whose Legendary Tiger Management has Helped Spawn Hundreds of New Hedge Funds (Business Insider)
Nearly two decades after Julian Robertson closed Tiger Management to outside investors, his fund still constantly pops up in headlines and conversations within the hedge fund industry he helped pioneer. The billionaire North Carolina native’s sprawling network of spin-offs and seeded start-ups is almost overwhelming, and has spawned fellow billionaires like Chase Coleman, O. Andreas Halvorsen, Philippe Laffont, and several others.
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Davidson Kempner Says Again It will Not be Tendering Qiagen Shares (Reuters)
BOSTON (Reuters) – Hedge fund Davidson Kempner said again on Thursday it will not be tendering its shares in Qiagen (QIA.DE), days after Thermo Fisher Scientific (TMO.N) said its offer to buy the German genetic test maker expires soon. “Davidson Kempner Will Not Be Tendering Into The Current Offer,” the hedge fund which owns a 3.1% stake in Qiagen said in a statement. It reiterated its position that it considers the current offer “wholly inadequate.”
Hedge Funds Say They Were Left Out of PG&E Stock Sales (The Wall Street Journal)
A group of hedge funds and debt investors that once dreamed of taking over PG&E Corp. are demanding hundreds of millions of dollars from the troubled utility, complaining they were unfairly shut out of a lucrative deal with big shareholders. Led by New York hedge fund Elliott Management Corp., the group of bondholders say PG&E failed to do what it could to ensure they received a slice of equity-raising action, which carried rewards for investors willing to take a chance and aid the California utility’s exit from bankruptcy.
Sculptor Hedge Fund Outflows Diminish While CLO Deals Weaken (Bloomberg)
Sculptor Capital Management Inc. said quarterly outflows in its main hedge fund diminished while its collateralized loan obligation business weakened. Clients pulled $108.5 million from the Sculptor Master Fund in the second quarter, according to a statement Thursday. The firm closed $409 million of CLO deals in the first half, versus $3 billion for all of last year.
Graal Will Soon be Gone Too (Hedge Nordic)
Stockholm (HedgeNordic) – Several days after announcing that two hedge funds from the Graal family will be merged into Aktie-Ansvar Räntestrategi, Aktie-Ansvar has announced that Graal will be merged into the same fixed-income fund. Graal, once Sweden’s largest hedge fund with about SEK 12 billion under management, will merge into the newly-launched Aktie-Ansvar Räntestrategi at the end of October. “Graal currently has a significant focus on fixed-income management and follows essentially the same investment strategy as Aktie-Ansvar Räntestrategi,” writes a letter accompanying the merger announcement. “Aktie-Ansvar has found it logical that Graal should be merged by way of absorption into Aktie-Ansvar Räntestrategi,” the letter continues.
Jeff Bezos Sold $3.1 Billion in Amazon Stock This Week (The Street)
Amazon (AMZN) – CEO Jeff Bezos sold more than $3.1 billion in Amazon stock this week as part of a prearranged 10b5-1 trading plan which allows major shareholders to sell a predetermined number of shares without accusations of insider trading. The $3.1 billion shares sold comes on top of the $4.1 billion in Amazon shares Bezos sold earlier this year, bringing his total share sales in 2020 to slightly more than $7.2 billion in the first eight months of the year. Bezos has previously said he plans to sell $1 billion worth of Amazon stock a year to fund his space firm, Blue Origin.
Thursday 8/6 Insider Buying Report: QDEL, CODI (Nasdaq.com)
At Quidel, a filing with the SEC revealed that on Monday, Director Edward L. Michael purchased 3,500 shares of QDEL, at a cost of $288.12 each, for a total investment of $1.01M. Michael was up about 6.5% on the purchase at the high point of today’s trading session, with QDEL trading as high as $306.72 in trading on Thursday. Quidel is trading down about 3.7% on the day Thursday. This buy marks the first one filed by Michael in the past twelve months. And at Compass Diversified Holdings, there was insider buying on Tuesday, by Elias Sabo who purchased 43,332 shares for a cost of $16.37 each, for a trade totaling $709,278. Before this latest buy, Sabo bought CODI on 2 other occasions during the past twelve months, for a total investment of $2.17M at an average of $19.80 per share. Compass Diversified Holdings is trading up about 2.3% on the day Thursday. So far Sabo is in the green, up about 4.3% on their purchase based on today’s trading high of $17.07.
Smartsheet Inc (SMAR) President and CEO Mark Patrick Mader Sold $1.9 million of Shares (Guru Focus)
President and CEO of Smartsheet Inc., Mark Patrick Mader, sold 40,000 shares of SMAR on 08/04/2020 at an average price of $47.64 a share. The total sale was $1.9 million. Smartsheet Inc has a market cap of $5.67 billion; its shares were traded at around $47.34 with and P/S ratio of 18.38. GuruFocus has detected 1 severe warning sign with Smartsheet Inc.
The EVP & Pres. Tools & Storage of Stanley Black & Decker (NYSE: SWK) is Selling Shares (Analyst Ratings)
Yesterday, the EVP & Pres. Tools & Storage of Stanley Black & Decker (SWK), Jeffrey Ansell, sold shares of SWK for $6M. In addition to Jeffrey Ansell, one other SWK executive reported Sell trades in the last month. The company has a one-year high of $173.67 and a one-year low of $70.00. SWK’s market cap is $25.12 billion and the company has a P/E ratio of 29.40. Currently, Stanley Black & Decker has an average volume of 149.74K.
