How Are Hedge Funds Trading Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (LEE)?

Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (NYSE:LEE) was in 4 hedge funds’ portfolio at the end of March. LEE investors should pay attention to a decrease in enthusiasm from smart money lately. There were 4 hedge funds in our database with LEE holdings at the end of the previous quarter.

If you’d ask most investors, hedge funds are seen as unimportant, old investment tools of yesteryear. While there are greater than 8000 funds with their doors open at the moment, we look at the masters of this club, around 450 funds. It is estimated that this group controls the lion’s share of the smart money’s total capital, and by watching their best stock picks, we have figured out a few investment strategies that have historically outperformed the S&P 500 index. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points a year for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve began to sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have topped the S&P 500 index by 23.3 percentage points in 8 months (see the details here).

Equally as important, optimistic insider trading sentiment is another way to break down the world of equities. Obviously, there are lots of reasons for an insider to cut shares of his or her company, but just one, very clear reason why they would buy. Plenty of academic studies have demonstrated the market-beating potential of this tactic if investors know where to look (learn more here).

With these “truths” under our belt, it’s important to take a look at the recent action surrounding Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (NYSE:LEE).

What have hedge funds been doing with Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (NYSE:LEE)?

At the end of the first quarter, a total of 4 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of 0% from one quarter earlier.

Due to the fact that Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (NYSE:LEE) has experienced falling interest from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, logic holds that there is a sect of hedgies who sold off their positions entirely heading into Q2. At the top of the heap, J. Carlo Cannell’s Cannell Capital cut the biggest position of the “upper crust” of funds we watch, worth an estimated $0.1 million in stock. These moves are intriguing to say the least, as aggregate hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).

What have insiders been doing with Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (NYSE:LEE)?

Insider buying is particularly usable when the company we’re looking at has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the last six-month time period, Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (NYSE:LEE) has seen zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

With the results demonstrated by Insider Monkey’s time-tested strategies, retail investors must always pay attention to hedge fund and insider trading activity, and Lee Enterprises, Incorporated (NYSE:LEE) is no exception.

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