If you’d ask most stock holders, hedge funds are perceived as underperforming, old investment vehicles of years past. While there are over 8000 funds trading at present, we at Insider Monkey look at the elite of this club, close to 450 funds. It is estimated that this group oversees the majority of the hedge fund industry’s total asset base, and by paying attention to their best stock picks, we have uncovered a few investment strategies that have historically outstripped Mr. Market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy outpaced 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 outpaced the S&P 500 index by 23.3 percentage points in 8 months (see the details here).
Equally as key, positive insider trading activity is another way to break down the financial markets. Just as you’d expect, there are a variety of stimuli for an upper level exec to cut shares of his or her company, but just one, very simple reason why they would buy. Various empirical studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this strategy if shareholders know where to look (learn more here).
Consequently, we’re going to take a peek at the key action encompassing K Swiss Inc (NASDAQ:KSWS).
How have hedgies been trading K Swiss Inc (NASDAQ:KSWS)?
At the end of the first quarter, a total of 7 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of -22% from one quarter earlier. With hedge funds’ capital changing hands, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes significantly.
When looking at the hedgies we track, Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management had the largest position in K Swiss Inc (NASDAQ:KSWS), worth close to $8.3 million, accounting for less than 0.1%% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Ric Dillon of Diamond Hill Capital, with a $4.1 million position; the fund has less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining hedgies that are bullish include Mario Gabelli’s GAMCO Investors, Paul Glazer’s Glazer Capital and Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies.
Since K Swiss Inc (NASDAQ:KSWS) has faced bearish sentiment from the aggregate hedge fund industry, it’s easy to see that there lies a certain “tier” of hedgies who sold off their full holdings in Q1. It’s worth mentioning that Robert Joseph Caruso’s Select Equity Group dumped the largest investment of the 450+ funds we watch, worth about $5.6 million in stock., and Chuck Royce of Royce & Associates was right behind this move, as the fund said goodbye to about $3.3 million worth. These bearish behaviors are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest dropped by 2 funds in Q1.
How are insiders trading K Swiss Inc (NASDAQ:KSWS)?
Bullish insider trading is most useful when the company in question has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the latest six-month time frame, K Swiss Inc (NASDAQ:KSWS) has experienced zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
With the returns shown by Insider Monkey’s research, everyday investors must always watch hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and K Swiss Inc (NASDAQ:KSWS) applies perfectly to this mantra.
