Hedge Funds Are Betting On United Bankshares, Inc. (UBSI)

The 700+ hedge funds and money managers tracked by Insider Monkey have already compiled and submitted their 13F filings for the third quarter, which unveil their equity positions as of September 30. We went through these filings and identified the changes in hedge fund positions. Our extensive review of these public filings is finally over, so this article is set to reveal the smart money sentiment towards United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI).

Is United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI) the right pick for your portfolio? The smart money is in an optimistic mood. The number of long hedge fund positions increased by 1 recently. At the end of this article we will also compare UBSI to other stocks, including Black Stone Minerals LP (NYSE:BSM), Fair Isaac Corporation (NYSE:FICO), and American National Insurance Company (NASDAQ:ANAT) to get a better sense of its popularity.

Today there are numerous gauges stock market investors put to use to appraise stocks. A couple of the most useful gauges are hedge fund and insider trading sentiment. Our experts have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the elite fund managers can trounce the S&P 500 by a very impressive amount (see the details here).

Keeping this in mind, let’s take a glance at the key action encompassing United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI).

What have hedge funds been doing with United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI)?

At the Q3’s end, a total of 7 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 17% from the second quarter. With hedgies’ capital changing hands, there exists a select group of key hedge fund managers who were upping their stakes meaningfully (or already accumulated large positions).

According to publicly available hedge fund and institutional investor holdings data compiled by Insider Monkey, Chuck Royce’s Royce & Associates has the number one position in United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI), worth close to $12.7 million, comprising 0.1% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Matthew Lindenbaum’s Basswood Capital, with an $6.8 million position; 0.3% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Some other peers with similar optimism consist of D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw, Cliff Asness’ AQR Capital Management and Israel Englander’s Millennium Management.

Consequently, key money managers have jumped into United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI) headfirst. Millennium Management created the biggest position in United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI). Millennium Management had $1.5 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Michael Platt and William Reeves’s BlueCrest Capital Mgmt. also initiated an $1 million position during the quarter.

Let’s now take a look at hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI). These stocks are Black Stone Minerals LP (NYSE:BSM), Fair Isaac Corporation (NYSE:FICO), American National Insurance Company (NASDAQ:ANAT), and Blackbaud, Inc. (NASDAQ:BLKB). This group of stocks’ market values resemble UBSI’s market value.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 14 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $130 million. That figure was just $29 million in UBSI’s case. Fair Isaac Corporation (NYSE:FICO) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Black Stone Minerals LP (NYSE:BSM) is the least popular one with only 4 bullish hedge fund positions. United Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:UBSI) is not the least popular stock in this group, but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard FICO might be a better candidate to consider a long position.