Here is What Hedge Funds Think About Moog Inc (MOG)

In this article you are going to find out whether hedge funds think Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG) is a good investment right now. We like to check what the smart money thinks first before doing extensive research on a given stock. Although there have been several high profile failed hedge fund picks, the consensus picks among hedge fund investors have historically outperformed the market after adjusting for known risk attributes. It’s not surprising given that hedge funds have access to better information and more resources to predict the winners in the stock market.

Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG) was in 20 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of March. MOG has experienced a decrease in hedge fund interest lately. There were 21 hedge funds in our database with MOG positions at the end of the previous quarter. Our calculations also showed that MOG 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.

In the 21st century investor’s toolkit there are several gauges shareholders have at their disposal to value publicly traded companies. Two of the most under-the-radar gauges are hedge fund and insider trading moves. Our researchers have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the top fund managers can trounce the market by a superb margin (see the details here).

Mario Gabelli of GAMCO Investors

We leave no stone unturned when looking for the next great investment idea. For example Europe is set to become the world’s largest cannabis market, so we check out this European marijuana stock pitch. We take a look at lists like the 10 most profitable companies in the world to identify the compounders that are likely to deliver double digit returns. We interview hedge fund managers and ask them about their best ideas. If you want to find out the best healthcare stock to buy right now, you can watch our latest hedge fund manager interview here. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. Our best call in 2020 was shorting the market when the S&P 500 was trading at 3150 after realizing the coronavirus pandemic’s significance before most investors. Now we’re going to analyze the key hedge fund action encompassing Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG).

Hedge fund activity in Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG)

At Q1’s end, a total of 20 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of -5% from the fourth quarter of 2019. The graph below displays the number of hedge funds with bullish position in MOG over the last 18 quarters. So, let’s review which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

Among these funds, D E Shaw held the most valuable stake in Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG), which was worth $23.6 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was Fisher Asset Management which amassed $11 million worth of shares. Millennium Management, GAMCO Investors, and AQR Capital Management were also very fond of the stock, becoming one of the largest hedge fund holders of the company. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Birch Run Capital allocated the biggest weight to Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG), around 1.27% of its 13F portfolio. Invenomic Capital Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 0.81 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to MOG.

Due to the fact that Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG) has experienced declining sentiment from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, we can see that there lies a certain “tier” of money managers that elected to cut their entire stakes last quarter. At the top of the heap, Renaissance Technologies cut the largest investment of the “upper crust” of funds tracked by Insider Monkey, valued at about $9.5 million in stock, and Donald Sussman’s Paloma Partners was right behind this move, as the fund dumped about $0.9 million worth. These moves are interesting, as total hedge fund interest fell by 1 funds last quarter.

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG). We will take a look at Atlas Corp. (NYSE:ATCO), CVR Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CVI), Federal Signal Corporation (NYSE:FSS), and Ameris Bancorp (NASDAQ:ABCB). This group of stocks’ market caps match MOG’s market cap.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 15 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $543 million. That figure was $68 million in MOG’s case. CVR Energy, Inc. (NYSE:CVI) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Atlas Corp. (NYSE:ATCO) is the least popular one with only 13 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks Moog Inc (NYSE:MOG) is more popular among hedge funds. 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 12.2% in 2020 through June 17th and still beat the market by 14.8 percentage points. Unfortunately MOG wasn’t nearly as popular as these 10 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on MOG were disappointed as the stock returned 4.6% during the second quarter (through June 17th) 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.

Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.