Investing in small cap stocks has historically been a way to outperform the market, as small cap companies typically grow faster on average than the blue chips. That outperformance comes with a price, however, as there are occasional periods of higher volatility. The time period between June 25 and the end of October was one of those periods, as the Russell 2000 ETF (IWM) has underperformed the larger S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by more than 14 percentage points. Given that the funds we track tend to have a disproportionate amount of their portfolios in smaller cap stocks, they have seen some volatility in their portfolios too. Actually, their moves are potentially one of the factors that contributed to this volatility. In this article, we use our extensive database of hedge fund holdings to find out what the smart money thinks of Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD).
Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD) investors should pay attention to an increase in enthusiasm from smart money in recent months. APD was in 77 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2015. There were 76 hedge funds in our database with APD holdings at the end of the previous quarter. The level and the change in hedge fund popularity aren’t the only variables you need to analyze to decipher hedge funds’ perspectives. A stock may witness a boost in popularity but it may still be less popular than similarly priced stocks. That’s why at the end of this article we will examine companies such as State Street Corporation (NYSE:STT), Equity Residential (NYSE:EQR), and Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) to gather more data points.
Follow Air Products & Chemicals Inc. (NYSE:APD)
Follow Air Products & Chemicals Inc. (NYSE:APD)
According to most investors, hedge funds are perceived as unimportant, outdated financial vehicles of years past. While there are greater than an 8000 funds trading today, Our experts choose to focus on the moguls of this group, approximately 700 funds. It is estimated that this group of investors administer the lion’s share of all hedge funds’ total asset base, and by shadowing their inimitable equity investments, Insider Monkey has uncovered several investment strategies that have historically outrun the broader indices. Insider Monkey’s small-cap hedge fund strategy exceeded the S&P 500 index by 12 percentage points per year for a decade in their back tests.
Now, let’s go over the recent action regarding Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD).
How have hedgies been trading Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD)?
Heading into Q4, a total of 77 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 1% from one quarter earlier. With hedge funds’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a few noteworthy hedge fund managers who were upping their stakes considerably (or already accumulated large positions).
According to Insider Monkey’s hedge fund database, Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square has the most valuable position in Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD), worth close to $2.62 billion, accounting for 18.8% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Viking Global, managed by Andreas Halvorsen, which holds a $754.9 million position; the fund has 2.9% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Other members of the smart money that are bullish consist of Eric W. Mandelblatt’s Soroban Capital Partners and Phill Gross and Robert Atchinson’s Adage Capital Management.
