Here is What Hedge Funds Think About Quidel Corporation (QDEL)

In this article you are going to find out whether hedge funds think Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL) 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.

Is Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL) a superb investment right now? Prominent investors were taking a bearish view. The number of long hedge fund positions retreated by 1 in recent months. Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL) was in 28 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the first quarter of 2021. The all time high for this statistic is 42. Our calculations also showed that QDEL isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q1 rankings). There were 29 hedge funds in our database with QDEL holdings at the end of December.

If you’d ask most shareholders, hedge funds are viewed as unimportant, outdated investment tools of the past. While there are greater than 8000 funds trading at the moment, Our researchers choose to focus on the masters of this club, approximately 850 funds. These money managers watch over bulk of the smart money’s total capital, and by paying attention to their inimitable equity investments, Insider Monkey has brought to light numerous investment strategies that have historically beaten Mr. Market. Insider Monkey’s flagship short hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 short ETFs by around 20 percentage points a year since its inception in March 2017. Also, our monthly newsletter’s portfolio of long stock picks returned 206.8% since March 2017 (through May 2021) and beat the S&P 500 Index by more than 115 percentage points. You can download a sample issue of this newsletter on our website .

Matthew Hulsizer of PEAK6 Capital

At Insider Monkey, we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, economists warn of inflation flare up. So, we are checking out this backdoor gold play that has hit peak gains of 718% in a little over a year. We go through lists like the 10 best battery stocks to pick the next Tesla that will deliver a 10x return. Even though we recommend positions in only a tiny fraction of the companies we analyze, we check out as many stocks as we can. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. You can subscribe to our free daily newsletter on our homepage. Now we’re going to take a glance at the new hedge fund action surrounding Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL).

Do Hedge Funds Think QDEL Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?

At Q1’s end, a total of 28 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of -3% from the fourth quarter of 2020. On the other hand, there were a total of 22 hedge funds with a bullish position in QDEL a year ago. So, let’s see which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

The largest stake in Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL) was held by AQR Capital Management, which reported holding $64.3 million worth of stock at the end of December. It was followed by Citadel Investment Group with a $56 million position. Other investors bullish on the company included Rima Senvest Management, GAMCO Investors, and Citadel Investment Group. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Birchview Capital allocated the biggest weight to Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL), around 4.45% of its 13F portfolio. Rima Senvest Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 1.12 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to QDEL.

Since Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL) has experienced falling interest from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, it’s safe to say that there exists a select few fund managers that decided to sell off their entire stakes in the first quarter. Intriguingly, Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital dropped the largest investment of the “upper crust” of funds followed by Insider Monkey, comprising close to $71.3 million in stock, and Brandon Haley’s Holocene Advisors was right behind this move, as the fund said goodbye to about $58.4 million worth. These bearish behaviors are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest dropped by 1 funds in the first quarter.

Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL). We will take a look at J2 Global Inc (NASDAQ:JCOM), KBR, Inc. (NYSE:KBR), Perrigo Co Plc (NASDAQ:PRGO), Ashland Global Holdings Inc.. (NYSE:ASH), Owl Rock Capital Corporation (NYSE:ORCC), Janus Henderson Group plc (NYSE:JHG), and Essent Group Ltd (NYSE:ESNT). This group of stocks’ market values are similar to QDEL’s market value.

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As you can see these stocks had an average of 27.7 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $648 million. That figure was $218 million in QDEL’s case. Ashland Global Holdings Inc.. (NYSE:ASH) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Owl Rock Capital Corporation (NYSE:ORCC) is the least popular one with only 20 bullish hedge fund positions. Quidel Corporation (NASDAQ:QDEL) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for QDEL is 49. Stocks with higher number of hedge fund positions relative to other stocks as well as relative to their historical range receive a higher sentiment score. 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 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 95.8% in 2019 and 2020, and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 40 percentage points. These stocks gained 24% in 2021 through July 9th and beat the market again by 6.7 percentage points. Unfortunately QDEL wasn’t nearly as popular as these 5 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on QDEL were disappointed as the stock returned -3.9% since the end of March (through 7/9) and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds as many of these stocks already outperformed the market since 2019.

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

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