Hedge Funds Are Selling Cumulus Media Inc (CMLS)

Is Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS) going to take off soon? Prominent investors are selling. The number of bullish hedge fund bets fell by 2 in recent months.

At the moment, there are many methods market participants can use to track publicly traded companies. A pair of the most underrated are hedge fund and insider trading activity. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the elite fund managers can beat the S&P 500 by a very impressive margin (see just how much).

Equally as integral, optimistic insider trading sentiment is a second way to break down the stock market universe. Obviously, there are lots of stimuli for a corporate insider to sell shares of his or her company, but only one, very simple reason why they would behave bullishly. Various academic studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this strategy if “monkeys” know what to do (learn more here).

Keeping this in mind, let’s take a look at the recent action surrounding Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS).

What does the smart money think about Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS)?

At the end of the first quarter, a total of 11 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of -15% from one quarter earlier. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly.

When looking at the hedgies we track, Canyon Capital Advisors, managed by Joshua Friedman and Mitchell Julis, holds the biggest position in Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS). Canyon Capital Advisors has a $89 million position in the stock, comprising 14.8% of its 13F portfolio. Coming in second is Howard Marks of Oaktree Capital Management, with a $13.4 million position; the fund has 0.3% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Other peers that hold long positions include Wallace Weitz’s Wallace R. Weitz & Co., Geoffrey Raynor’s Q Investments (Specter Holdings) and Andy Redleaf’s Whitebox Advisors.

Because Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS) has faced bearish sentiment from the smart money, it’s safe to say that there lies a certain “tier” of money managers who were dropping their full holdings heading into Q2. It’s worth mentioning that John Kleinheinz’s Kleinheinz Capital Partners sold off the biggest stake of the “upper crust” of funds we key on, valued at close to $7.8 million in stock.. Nancy Havens-Hasty’s fund, Havens Advisors, also said goodbye to its stock, about $1.3 million worth. These transactions are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest dropped by 2 funds heading into Q2.

Insider trading activity in Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS)

Insider trading activity, especially when it’s bullish, is particularly usable when the company in focus has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the last 180-day time frame, Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS) has seen 2 unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

With the returns exhibited by our strategies, retail investors must always pay attention to hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Cumulus Media Inc (NASDAQ:CMLS) is an important part of this process.

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