Is Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP) a good bet right now? We like to analyze hedge fund sentiment before conducting days of in-depth research. We do so because hedge funds and other elite investors have numerous Ivy League graduates, expert network advisers, and supply chain tipsters working or consulting for them. There is not a shortage of news stories covering failed hedge fund investments and it is a fact that hedge funds’ picks don’t beat the market 100% of the time, but their consensus picks have historically done very well and have outperformed the market after adjusting for risk.
Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP) shareholders have witnessed an increase in support from the world’s most elite money managers recently. GMLP was in 6 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of June. There were 4 hedge funds in our database with GMLP positions at the end of the previous quarter. Our calculations also showed that GMLP isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (see the video below).
Video: Click the image to watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.
Today there are plenty of tools investors can use to value publicly traded companies. Two of the less utilized tools are hedge fund and insider trading interest. Our researchers have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the elite fund managers can outperform the market by a very impressive margin (see the details here).
Unlike former hedge manager, Dr. Steve Sjuggerud, who is convinced Dow will soar past 40000, our long-short investment strategy doesn’t rely on bull markets to deliver double digit returns. We only rely on hedge fund buy/sell signals. We’re going to take a peek at the latest hedge fund action surrounding Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP).
How have hedgies been trading Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP)?
At Q2’s end, a total of 6 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 50% from the first quarter of 2019. By comparison, 4 hedge funds held shares or bullish call options in GMLP a year ago. So, let’s find out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.
Of the funds tracked by Insider Monkey, Huber Capital Management, managed by Joe Huber, holds the largest position in Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP). Huber Capital Management has a $31.5 million position in the stock, comprising 3.7% of its 13F portfolio. The second most bullish fund manager is Citadel Investment Group, managed by Ken Griffin, which holds a $1.5 million position; less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Some other professional money managers that hold long positions encompass Renaissance Technologies, Israel Englander’s Millennium Management and Matthew Hulsizer’s PEAK6 Capital Management.
As one would reasonably expect, specific money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. Millennium Management, managed by Israel Englander, assembled the largest position in Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP). Millennium Management had $1 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Matthew Hulsizer’s PEAK6 Capital Management also made a $0.5 million investment in the stock during the quarter.
Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP). We will take a look at Lakeland Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:LBAI), HomeStreet Inc (NASDAQ:HMST), Delek Logistics Partners LP (NYSE:DKL), and Banco Latinoamericano de Comercio Exterior, S.A. (NYSE:BLX). This group of stocks’ market caps are closest to GMLP’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| LBAI | 11 | 52691 | -1 |
| HMST | 9 | 17189 | -1 |
| DKL | 1 | 2994 | 0 |
| BLX | 1 | 6963 | 0 |
| Average | 5.5 | 19959 | -0.5 |
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 $20 million. That figure was $36 million in GMLP’s case. Lakeland Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:LBAI) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Delek Logistics Partners LP (NYSE:DKL) is the least popular one with only 1 bullish hedge fund positions. Golar LNG Partners LP (NASDAQ:GMLP) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. This is a slightly positive signal but we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 24.4% in 2019 through September 30th and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 4 percentage points. Unfortunately GMLP wasn’t nearly as popular as these 20 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on GMLP were disappointed as the stock returned -12.1% during the third 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 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds as many of these stocks already outperformed the market so far this year.
Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
