Insider Monkey has processed numerous 13F filings of hedge funds and successful value investors to create an extensive database of hedge fund holdings. The 13F filings show the hedge funds’ and successful investors’ positions as of the end of the first quarter. You can find articles about an individual hedge fund’s trades on numerous financial news websites. However, in this article we will take a look at their collective moves over the last 4.5 years and analyze what the smart money thinks of The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC) based on that data and determine whether they were really smart about the stock.
The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC) has experienced an increase in enthusiasm from smart money in recent months. Our calculations also showed that FLIC 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.
Hedge funds’ reputation as shrewd investors has been tarnished in the last decade as their hedged returns couldn’t keep up with the unhedged returns of the market indices. Our research was able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by more than 58 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’ll significantly underperform the market. We have been tracking and sharing the list of these stocks since February 2017 and they lost 36% through May 18th. That’s why we believe hedge fund sentiment is an extremely useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.
Richard Chilton of Chilton Investment Company
At Insider Monkey we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. There is a lot of volatility in the markets and this presents amazing investment opportunities from time to time. For example, this trader claims to deliver juiced up returns with one trade a week, so we are checking out his highest conviction idea. A second trader claims to score lucrative profits by utilizing a “weekend trading strategy”, so we look into his strategy’s picks. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. We recently recommended several stocks partly inspired by legendary Bill Miller’s investor letter. Our best call in 2020 was shorting the market when the S&P 500 was trading at 3150 in February after realizing the coronavirus pandemic’s significance before most investors. Now let’s go over the new hedge fund action regarding The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC).
How are hedge funds trading The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC)?
Heading into the second quarter of 2020, a total of 12 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 33% from the previous quarter. On the other hand, there were a total of 9 hedge funds with a bullish position in FLIC a year ago. So, let’s see which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.
The largest stake in The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC) was held by Renaissance Technologies, which reported holding $14.4 million worth of stock at the end of September. It was followed by Diamond Hill Capital with a $6.2 million position. Other investors bullish on the company included Millennium Management, Chilton Investment Company, and MFP Investors. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position MFP Investors allocated the biggest weight to The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC), around 0.3% of its 13F portfolio. EJF Capital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, earmarking 0.2 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to FLIC.
As aggregate interest increased, key hedge funds have been driving this bullishness. EJF Capital, managed by Emanuel J. Friedman, assembled the biggest position in The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC). EJF Capital had $1 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group also made a $0.3 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The only other fund with a new position in the stock is Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital.
Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC). These stocks are Anika Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:ANIK), GoPro Inc (NASDAQ:GPRO), Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior, S.A. (NYSE:BLX), and American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:AXL). All of these stocks’ market caps match FLIC’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| ANIK | 19 | 48692 | 0 |
| GPRO | 9 | 199300 | -1 |
| BLX | 3 | 30130 | 0 |
| AXL | 22 | 44333 | -1 |
| Average | 13.25 | 80614 | -0.5 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 13.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $81 million. That figure was $31 million in FLIC’s case. American Axle & Manufacturing Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:AXL) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior, S.A. (NYSE:BLX) is the least popular one with only 3 bullish hedge fund positions. The First of Long Island Corporation (NASDAQ:FLIC) 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 12.3% in 2020 through June 30th and surpassed the market by 15.5 percentage points. Unfortunately FLIC wasn’t nearly as popular as these 10 stocks (hedge fund sentiment was quite bearish); FLIC investors were disappointed as the stock returned -5.8% 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.
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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
