Hedge Funds Are Crazy About Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (GS)

Is Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS) going to take off soon? The best stock pickers are in a bullish mood. The number of bullish hedge fund positions rose by 10 recently.

In the 21st century investor’s toolkit, there are plenty of indicators investors can use to watch stocks. A couple of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading movement. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the top fund managers can outclass their index-focused peers by a superb amount (see just how much).

Equally as beneficial, positive insider trading sentiment is another way to parse down the stock market universe. As the old adage goes: there are a number of motivations for a bullish insider to downsize shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would buy. Plenty of academic studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this strategy if piggybackers understand what to do (learn more here).

Keeping this in mind, let’s take a glance at the latest action surrounding Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS).

What have hedge funds been doing with Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS)?

In preparation for this quarter, a total of 60 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of 20% from the previous quarter. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly.

Of the funds we track, Boykin Curry’s Eagle Capital Management had the largest position in Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS), worth close to $373 million, comprising 2.2% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Richard S. Pzena of Pzena Investment Management, with a $249.1 million position; the fund has 1.7% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other hedgies that hold long positions include William B. Gray’s Orbis Investment Management, Phill Gross and Robert Atchinson’s Adage Capital Management and Ken Heebner’s Capital Growth Management.

Now, specific money managers have been driving this bullishness. Capital Growth Management, managed by Ken Heebner, initiated the biggest position in Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS). Capital Growth Management had 124 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Donald Chiboucis’s Columbus Circle Investors also initiated a $117 million position during the quarter. The other funds with new positions in the stock are Andreas Halvorsen’s Viking Global, Paul Ruddock and Steve Heinz’s Lansdowne Partners, and Stanley Druckenmiller’s Duquesne Capital.

What do corporate executives and insiders think about Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS)?

Bullish insider trading is best served when the company we’re looking at has experienced transactions within the past half-year. Over the latest half-year time period, Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS) has seen zero unique insiders purchasing, and 7 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also take a look at hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE:GS). These stocks are CBOE Holdings, Inc (NASDAQ:CBOE), Ares Capital Corporation (NASDAQ:ARCC), NASDAQ OMX Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:NDAQ), NYSE Euronext (NYSE:NYX), and IntercontinentalExchange Inc (NYSE:ICE). This group of stocks are in the diversified investments industry and their market caps match GS’s market cap.