Hedge Funds Are Selling Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (HA)

Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA) was in 11 hedge funds’ portfolio at the end of the fourth quarter of 2012. HA investors should pay attention to a decrease in hedge fund interest of late. There were 12 hedge funds in our database with HA positions at the end of the previous quarter.

If you’d ask most investors, hedge funds are seen as worthless, old financial tools of yesteryear. While there are greater than 8000 funds in operation at present, we look at the moguls of this club, about 450 funds. It is widely believed that this group oversees the lion’s share of the hedge fund industry’s total capital, and by paying attention to their highest performing picks, we have unearthed a number of investment strategies that have historically outperformed the market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per year for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve started sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have beaten the S&P 500 index by 24 percentage points in 7 months (see all of our picks from August).

Just as important, optimistic insider trading activity is another way to parse down the financial markets. Obviously, there are a variety of reasons for a bullish insider to sell shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would buy. Several empirical studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this strategy if piggybackers know what to do (learn more here).

Now, it’s important to take a gander at the key action regarding Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA).

What have hedge funds been doing with Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA)?

Heading into 2013, a total of 11 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of -8% from the previous quarter. With the smart money’s capital changing hands, there exists an “upper tier” of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly.

According to our comprehensive database, Andy Redleaf’s Whitebox Advisors had the biggest position in Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA), worth close to $10.4 million, accounting for 0.5% of its total 13F portfolio. Coming in second is Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, which held a $3.5 million position; the fund has less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Other peers that hold long positions include Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group, Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital and Charles Davidson’s Wexford Capital.

Since Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA) has witnessed a declination in interest from hedge fund managers, it’s safe to say that there was a specific group of fund managers who sold off their full holdings last quarter. At the top of the heap, Joshua Friedman and Mitchell Julis’s Canyon Capital Advisors said goodbye to the biggest stake of the 450+ funds we monitor, comprising close to $7.7 million in stock.. D. E. Shaw’s fund, D E Shaw, also cut its stock, about $0.1 million worth. These moves are interesting, as total hedge fund interest was cut by 1 funds last quarter.

How have insiders been trading Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA)?

Insider buying is best served when the company in focus has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the last six-month time frame, Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA) has seen 1 unique insiders buying, and 6 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also review hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Hawaiian Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:HA). These stocks are Allegiant Travel Company (NASDAQ:ALGT), Gol Linhas Aereas Inteligentes SA (ADR) (NYSE:GOL), SkyWest, Inc. (NASDAQ:SKYW), and Republic Airways Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:RJET). This group of stocks are in the regional airlines industry and their market caps are closest to HA’s market cap.