Hedge Fund Manager Edgar Wachenheim’s Top Picks for 2013

13F filings are released several weeks after the end of a quarter and disclose many of the long equity positions held by a hedge fund or other major investor. Since 13D and 13G filings only occur when a fund large percentage stake in a company- which in itself generally excludes large-cap and mega-cap stocks- 13Fs are the most comprehensive picture of where a fund’s money is invested. Retail investors should not blindly follow any fund managers, but we like to think of 13Fs as free- albeit slightly stale- investment ideas. As with any investment ideas, it’s best to do more research on these companies before making any decisions. Read on for our quick take on five stocks which value investor Edgar Wachenheim’s Greenhaven Associates reported owning at the beginning of the year and compare them to previous filings.

Greenhaven’s top pick was home improvement store Lowe’s Companies, Inc. (NYSE:LOW), with over 12 million shares in its portfolio at the end of December. Lowe’s is up 42% in the last year, partly due to optimism about housing and construction. It trades at 23 times trailing earnings, which we’d generally consider high for a value investment, though the company did report sharp earnings growth in its most recent quarterly report versus a year earlier. Billionaire Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group increased the size of its own position in Lowe’s during the third quarter of 2012 (see Griffin’s stock picks).

Wachenheim and his team also liked the shipping industry, reporting ownership of 4.5 million shares of FedEx Corporation (NYSE:FDX). The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust is another major investor in the company, with over 3 million shares as of the end of September (check out more stocks the trust is invested in). Fedex’s most recent fiscal quarter ended in November, with the company experiencing a modest increase in revenue compared to the same period in the previous fiscal year but a 12% decline in earnings. The stock has a trailing P/E multiple of 16 and a trailing EV/EBITDA multiple of 5.9x.

Three more stocks Greenhaven likes, including UPS: