Here is What Hedge Funds Think About Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX)

Is Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX) a great investment right now? Hedge funds are taking an optimistic view. The number of bullish hedge fund bets moved up by 3 recently.

In the financial world, there are plenty of methods investors can use to track the equity markets. Some of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading activity. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the best hedge fund managers can trounce their index-focused peers by a healthy amount (see just how much).

Equally as integral, bullish insider trading sentiment is a second way to parse down the world of equities. As the old adage goes: there are plenty of incentives for an insider to drop shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would initiate a purchase. Plenty of academic studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this method if you know where to look (learn more here).

With all of this in mind, let’s take a gander at the key action regarding Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX).

What have hedge funds been doing with Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX)?

At year’s end, a total of 23 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of 15% from the previous quarter. With hedge funds’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of key hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings considerably.

Of the funds we track, Richard S. Pzena’s Pzena Investment Management had the largest position in Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX), worth close to $261 million, comprising 2.1% of its total 13F portfolio. Coming in second is David Blood and Al Gore of Generation Investment Management, with a $232 million position; 0% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Other hedge funds with similar optimism include Donald Yacktman’s Yacktman Asset Management, Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group and Mario Gabelli’s GAMCO Investors.

As aggregate interest increased, specific money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, assembled the biggest position in Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX). Renaissance Technologies had 9 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Glenn Russell Dubin’s Highbridge Capital Management also initiated a $1 million position during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new BDX investors: James Dondero’s Highland Capital Management, SAC Subsidiary’s Sigma Capital Management, and Jacob Gottlieb’s Visium Asset Management.

How are insiders trading Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX)?

Insider buying is at its handiest when the company in focus has seen transactions within the past half-year. Over the last six-month time period, Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX) has experienced zero unique insiders buying, and 9 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

With the returns exhibited by Insider Monkey’s strategies, retail investors must always monitor hedge fund and insider trading activity, and Becton, Dickinson and Co. (NYSE:BDX) is an important part of this process.

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