Here is What Hedge Funds Think About Schlumberger Limited. (SLB)

The latest 13F reporting period has come and gone, and Insider Monkey is again at the forefront when it comes to making use of this gold mine of data. We have processed the filings of the more than 867 world-class investment firms that we track and now have access to the collective wisdom contained in these filings, which are based on their September 30th holdings, data that is available nowhere else. Should you consider Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB) for your portfolio? We’ll look to this invaluable collective wisdom for the answer.

Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB) was in 39 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of September. The all time high for this statistic is 61. SLB investors should be aware of a decrease in support from the world’s most elite money managers lately. There were 41 hedge funds in our database with SLB positions at the end of the second quarter. Our calculations also showed that SLB isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings).

At Insider Monkey, we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, lithium prices have more than doubled over the past year, so we go through lists like the 10 best EV 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. With all of this in mind let’s review the new hedge fund action encompassing Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB).

William Gray of Orbis Investment Management

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

At Q3’s end, a total of 39 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of -5% from the previous quarter. On the other hand, there were a total of 53 hedge funds with a bullish position in SLB a year ago. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes meaningfully (or already accumulated large positions).

Among these funds, Fisher Asset Management held the most valuable stake in Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB), which was worth $478.1 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was D E Shaw which amassed $146.5 million worth of shares. Holocene Advisors, Citadel Investment Group, and Orbis Investment 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 Lodge Hill Capital allocated the biggest weight to Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB), around 3.83% of its 13F portfolio. Hourglass Capital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 2.95 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to SLB.

Judging by the fact that Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB) has faced bearish sentiment from the smart money, it’s easy to see that there were a few hedgies that decided to sell off their entire stakes heading into Q4. It’s worth mentioning that Ryan Caldwell’s Chiron Investment Management said goodbye to the biggest stake of the 750 funds tracked by Insider Monkey, totaling about $32.7 million in stock, and Todd J. Kantor’s Encompass Capital Advisors was right behind this move, as the fund dumped about $24.7 million worth. These moves are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest dropped by 2 funds heading into Q4.

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB). We will take a look at Lucid Group Inc. (NASDAQ:LCID), Trane Technologies plc (NYSE:TT), Digital Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE:DLR), Walgreens Boots Alliance Inc (NASDAQ:WBA), Pioneer Natural Resources Company (NYSE:PXD), American Electric Power Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:AEP), and Prudential Financial Inc (NYSE:PRU). This group of stocks’ market valuations match SLB’s market valuation.

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As you can see these stocks had an average of 34.1 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $693 million. That figure was $1063 million in SLB’s case. Pioneer Natural Resources Company (NYSE:PXD) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Lucid Group Inc. (NASDAQ:LCID) is the least popular one with only 18 bullish hedge fund positions. Schlumberger Limited. (NYSE:SLB) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for SLB is 57.2. 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 28.6% in 2021 through November 30th and beat the market again by 5.6 percentage points. Unfortunately SLB wasn’t nearly as popular as these 5 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on SLB were disappointed as the stock returned -2.8% since the end of September (through 11/30) 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.