Here is What Hedge Funds Think About CEVA, Inc. (CEVA)

CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA) has experienced a decrease in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds lately.

To most investors, hedge funds are perceived as worthless, old investment vehicles of years past. While there are more than 8000 funds in operation at present, we at Insider Monkey look at the elite of this club, close to 450 funds. Most estimates calculate that this group has its hands on the lion’s share of all hedge funds’ total capital, and by tracking their top stock picks, we have identified a few investment strategies that have historically beaten the S&P 500 index. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy outpaced the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per year 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 trumped the S&P 500 index by 23.3 percentage points in 8 months (see the details here).

Equally as beneficial, optimistic insider trading activity is another way to break down the world of equities. As the old adage goes: there are lots of incentives for an insider to drop shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would behave bullishly. Several empirical studies have demonstrated the market-beating potential of this tactic if “monkeys” know where to look (learn more here).

Consequently, we’re going to take a gander at the key action regarding CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA).

What does the smart money think about CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA)?

In preparation for this quarter, a total of 10 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of -23% from one quarter earlier. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings substantially.

Of the funds we track, Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies had the most valuable position in CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA), worth close to $7.7 million, comprising less than 0.1%% of its total 13F portfolio. On Renaissance Technologies’s heels is Kendall Square Capital, managed by Jason F. Harris, which held a $7.5 million position; 5% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Some other hedge funds that are bullish include Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group, Joseph A. Jolson’s Harvest Capital Strategies and Joel Greenblatt’s Gotham Asset Management.

Judging by the fact that CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA) has faced a declination in interest from the smart money, it’s easy to see that there were a few fund managers who were dropping their entire stakes last quarter. At the top of the heap, Panayotis Takis Sparaggis’s Alkeon Capital Management dropped the largest investment of all the hedgies we key on, totaling an estimated $6.2 million in stock.. John Fichthorn’s fund, Dialectic Capital Management, also dropped its stock, about $0.5 million worth. These bearish behaviors are intriguing to say the least, as total hedge fund interest fell by 3 funds last quarter.

What do corporate executives and insiders think about CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA)?

Insider trading activity, especially when it’s bullish, is at its handiest when the company we’re looking at has seen transactions within the past half-year. Over the latest six-month time frame, CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA) has seen zero unique insiders buying, 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 CEVA, Inc. (NASDAQ:CEVA). These stocks are Alpha and Omega Semiconductor Ltd (NASDAQ:AOSL), NVE Corporation (NASDAQ:NVEC), Trina Solar Limited (ADR) (NYSE:TSL), IXYS Corporation (NASDAQ:IXYS), and GT Advanced Technologies Inc (NASDAQ:GTAT). This group of stocks are the members of the semiconductor – specialized industry and their market caps resemble CEVA’s market cap.