At the end of February we announced the arrival of the first US recession since 2009 and we predicted that the market will decline by at least 20% in (Recession is Imminent: We Need A Travel Ban NOW). In these volatile markets we scrutinize hedge fund filings to get a reading on which direction each stock might be going. In this article, we will take a closer look at hedge fund sentiment towards Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD).
Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD) has seen a decrease in hedge fund interest lately. Our calculations also showed that PMD isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q1 rankings and see the video for a quick look at the top 5 stocks).
Video: Watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.
So, why do we pay attention to hedge fund sentiment before making any investment decisions? Our research has shown that hedge funds’ small-cap stock picks managed to beat the market by double digits annually between 1999 and 2016, but the margin of outperformance has been declining in recent years. Nevertheless, we were still able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by more than 44 percentage points since March 2017 (see the details here). We were also able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that underperformed the market by 10 percentage points annually between 2006 and 2017. Interestingly the margin of underperformance of these stocks has been increasing in recent years. Investors who are long the market and short these stocks would have returned more than 27% annually between 2015 and 2017. We have been tracking and sharing the list of these stocks since February 2017 in our quarterly newsletter. Even if you aren’t comfortable with shorting stocks, you should at least avoid initiating long positions in stocks that are in our short portfolio.
Jim Simons Founder of Renaissance Technologies
At Insider Monkey we leave no stone unturned when looking for the next great investment idea. For example, legendary investor Bill Miller told investors to sell 7 extremely popular recession stocks last month. So, we went through his list and recommended another stock with 100% upside potential instead. We interview hedge fund managers and ask them about their best ideas. You can watch our latest hedge fund manager interview here and find out the name of the large-cap healthcare stock that Sio Capital’s Michael Castor expects to double. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. Our best call in 2020 was shorting the market when S&P 500 was trading at 3150 after realizing the coronavirus pandemic’s significance before most investors. With all of this in mind let’s go over the latest hedge fund action surrounding Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD).
How have hedgies been trading Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD)?
At Q1’s end, a total of 3 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of -25% from the fourth quarter of 2019. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards PMD over the last 18 quarters. With the smart money’s positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a few noteworthy hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes significantly (or already accumulated large positions).
According to publicly available hedge fund and institutional investor holdings data compiled by Insider Monkey, Renaissance Technologies, holds the largest position in Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD). Renaissance Technologies has a $2.7 million position in the stock, comprising less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Ancora Advisors, managed by Frederick DiSanto, which holds a $0.5 million position; the fund has less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Ancora Advisors allocated the biggest weight to Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD), around 0.02% of its 13F portfolio. Royce & Associates is also relatively very bullish on the stock, dishing out 0.0031 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to PMD.
We view hedge fund activity in the stock unfavorable, but in this case there was only a single hedge fund selling its entire position: Springbok Capital. One hedge fund selling its entire position doesn’t always imply a bearish intent. Theoretically a hedge fund may decide to sell a promising position in order to invest the proceeds in a more promising idea. However, we don’t think this is the case in this case because none of the 750+ hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey identified PMD as a viable investment and initiated a position in the stock.
Let’s now take a look at hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD) but similarly valued. These stocks are Pacific Drilling SA (NYSE:PACD), Gulf Resources, Inc. (NASDAQ:GURE), SandRidge Energy Inc. (NYSE:SD), and Heat Biologics, Inc. (NASDAQ:HTBX). This group of stocks’ market valuations are similar to PMD’s market valuation.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| PACD | 8 | 22303 | 0 |
| GURE | 1 | 1224 | 0 |
| SD | 12 | 9952 | -2 |
| HTBX | 1 | 1025 | -1 |
| Average | 5.5 | 8626 | -0.75 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 5.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $9 million. That figure was $3 million in PMD’s case. SandRidge Energy Inc. (NYSE:SD) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Gulf Resources, Inc. (NASDAQ:GURE) is the least popular one with only 1 bullish hedge fund positions. Psychemedics Corp. (NASDAQ:PMD) 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. Our calculations showed that top 10 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 41.4% in 2019 and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 10.1 percentage points. These stocks gained 7.9% in 2020 through May 22nd and surpassed the market by 15.6 percentage points. Unfortunately PMD wasn’t nearly as popular as these 10 stocks (hedge fund sentiment was quite bearish); PMD investors were disappointed as the stock returned -14.9% during the second quarter and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 10 most popular stocks among hedge funds as most of these stocks already outperformed the market in 2020.
Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
