Hedge Funds Are Selling Stag Industrial Inc (STAG): Sovran Self Storage Inc (SSS), Potlatch Corporation (PCH)

Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG) was in 9 hedge funds’ portfolio at the end of December. STAG shareholders have witnessed a decrease in hedge fund sentiment of late. There were 9 hedge funds in our database with STAG holdings at the end of the previous quarter.

To most market participants, hedge funds are perceived as underperforming, old investment tools of years past. While there are more than 8000 funds in operation at the moment, we choose to focus on the masters of this group, around 450 funds. It is estimated that this group controls the majority of all hedge funds’ total asset base, and by watching their highest performing equity investments, we have spotted a few investment strategies that have historically outperformed the broader indices. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points annually 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 outperformed the S&P 500 index by 24 percentage points in 7 months (see all of our picks from August).

Equally as key, optimistic insider trading activity is a second way to parse down the stock market universe. Just as you’d expect, there are a variety of reasons for a corporate insider to sell shares of his or her company, but only one, very obvious reason why they would buy. Several academic studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this tactic if investors understand where to look (learn more here).

Consequently, it’s important to take a peek at the latest action surrounding Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG).

How have hedgies been trading Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG)?

At the end of the fourth quarter, a total of 9 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of 0% from the third quarter. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists a few key hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings substantially.

Of the funds we track, J. Alan Reid, Jr.’s Forward Management had the most valuable position in Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG), worth close to $36 million, accounting for 2.5% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, which held a $5 million position; the fund has 0% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other hedgies that are bullish include Israel Englander’s Millennium Management, Richard Driehaus’s Driehaus Capital and Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management.

Seeing as Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG) has faced falling interest from the aggregate hedge fund industry, it’s easy to see that there was a specific group of fund managers that elected to cut their positions entirely heading into 2013. Interestingly, Anthony Bozza’s Lakewood Capital Management dumped the biggest investment of all the hedgies we track, totaling about $6 million in stock.. Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s fund, Arrowstreet Capital, also dropped its stock, about $0 million worth. These bearish behaviors are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).

How are insiders trading Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG)?

Bullish insider trading is best served when the primary stock in question has experienced transactions within the past 180 days. Over the last half-year time frame, Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG) has experienced 8 unique insiders purchasing, and 1 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also examine hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG). These stocks are Sovran Self Storage Inc (NYSE:SSS), Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH), First Industrial Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE:FR), Eastgroup Properties Inc (NYSE:EGP), and Monmouth R.E. Inv. Corp. (NYSE:MNR). This group of stocks are in the reit – industrial industry and their market caps resemble STAG’s market cap.

With the returns shown by our research, retail investors should always pay attention to hedge fund and insider trading activity, and Stag Industrial Inc (NYSE:STAG) is no exception.

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