Before we spend countless hours researching a company, we like to analyze what insiders, hedge funds and billionaire investors think of the stock first. This is a necessary first step in our investment process because our research has shown that the elite investors’ consensus returns have been exceptional. In the following paragraphs, we find out what the billionaire investors and hedge funds think of Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA).
Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA) was in 21 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of March. The all time high for this statistic is 23. ENVA investors should pay attention to an increase in hedge fund interest recently. There were 20 hedge funds in our database with ENVA holdings at the end of December. Our calculations also showed that ENVA isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q1 rankings).
Hedge funds’ reputation as shrewd investors has been tarnished in the last decade as their hedged returns couldn’t keep up with the unhedged returns of the market indices. Hedge funds have more than $3.5 trillion in assets under management, so you can’t expect their entire portfolios to beat the market by large margins. Our research was able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by more than 115 percentage points since March 2017 (see the details here). So you can still find a lot of gems by following hedge funds’ moves today.
At Insider Monkey, we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, Chuck Schumer recently stated that marijuana legalization will be a Senate priority. So, we are checking out this under the radar stock that will benefit from this. We go through lists like the 10 best battery stocks to pick the next Tesla that will deliver a 10x return. Even though we recommend positions in only a tiny fraction of the companies we analyze, we check out as many stocks as we can. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. You can subscribe to our free daily newsletter on our homepage. Now we’re going to take a look at the latest hedge fund action encompassing Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA).
Do Hedge Funds Think ENVA Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?
Heading into the second quarter of 2021, a total of 21 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of 5% from the previous quarter. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards ENVA over the last 23 quarters. With the smart money’s positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a few key hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly (or already accumulated large positions).
Of the funds tracked by Insider Monkey, Ari Zweiman’s 683 Capital Partners has the biggest position in Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA), worth close to $108.2 million, comprising 5.7% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Renaissance Technologies, led by Jim Simons (founder), holding a $66 million position; the fund has 0.1% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other members of the smart money with similar optimism comprise George McCabe’s Portolan Capital Management, Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital and Harry Gail’s Harspring Capital Management. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Second Curve Capital allocated the biggest weight to Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA), around 8.99% of its 13F portfolio. 683 Capital Partners is also relatively very bullish on the stock, designating 5.72 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to ENVA.
As one would reasonably expect, key money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. Harspring Capital Management, managed by Harry Gail, established the most outsized position in Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA). Harspring Capital Management had $8.9 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Tom Brown’s Second Curve Capital also made a $6.4 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with brand new ENVA positions are Donald Sussman’s Paloma Partners, Jonathan Soros’s JS Capital, and Bruce Kovner’s Caxton Associates LP.
Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Comstock Resources Inc (NYSE:CRK), NV5 Global Inc (NASDAQ:NVEE), StoneX Group Inc. (NASDAQ:SNEX), CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA), Paya Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PAYA), Ocugen, Inc. (NASDAQ:OCGN), and AZZ Incorporated (NYSE:AZZ). All of these stocks’ market caps are similar to ENVA’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| CRK | 14 | 75581 | -8 |
| NVEE | 16 | 62776 | 6 |
| SNEX | 9 | 121498 | -3 |
| CEVA | 12 | 16442 | -5 |
| PAYA | 29 | 249340 | 8 |
| OCGN | 6 | 10091 | 3 |
| AZZ | 13 | 41720 | -2 |
| Average | 14.1 | 82493 | -0.1 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 14.1 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $82 million. That figure was $251 million in ENVA’s case. Paya Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PAYA) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Ocugen, Inc. (NASDAQ:OCGN) is the least popular one with only 6 bullish hedge fund positions. Enova International Inc (NYSE:ENVA) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for ENVA is 66. Stocks with higher number of hedge fund positions relative to other stocks as well as relative to their historical range receive a higher sentiment score. This is a slightly positive signal but we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. Our calculations showed that top 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 95.8% in 2019 and 2020, and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 40 percentage points. These stocks gained 23.8% in 2021 through July 16th and beat the market again by 7.7 percentage points. Unfortunately ENVA wasn’t nearly as popular as these 5 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on ENVA were disappointed as the stock returned -8.6% since the end of March (through 7/16) and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds as many of these stocks already outperformed the market since 2019.
Follow Enova International Inc. (NYSE:ENVA)
Follow Enova International Inc. (NYSE:ENVA)
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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
