Here is What Hedge Funds Think About Taseko Mines Limited (TGB)

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 at Insider Monkey have plowed through 817 13F filings that hedge funds and well-known value investors are required to file by the SEC. The 13F filings show the funds’ and investors’ portfolio positions as of September 30th, about a month before the elections. In this article we look at what those investors think of Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB).

Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB) was in 5 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of September. The all time high for this statistics is 8. TGB investors should pay attention to an increase in enthusiasm from smart money recently. There were 3 hedge funds in our database with TGB positions at the end of the second quarter. Our calculations also showed that TGB isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 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.

Why do we pay any attention at all to hedge fund sentiment? Our research has shown that a select group of hedge fund holdings outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by 66 percentage points since March 2017 (see the details here). We were also able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that’ll significantly underperform the market. We have been tracking and sharing the list of these stocks since February 2017 and they lost 13% through November 17th. That’s why we believe hedge fund sentiment is an extremely useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.

Michael Platt of BlueCrest Capital Mgmt.

At Insider Monkey we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, Federal Reserve has been creating trillions of dollars electronically to keep the interest rates near zero. We believe this will lead to inflation and boost real estate prices. So, we recommended this real estate stock to our monthly premium newsletter subscribers. We go through lists like the 15 best blue chip stocks to pick the best large-cap stocks to buy. 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 website. Keeping this in mind let’s analyze the latest hedge fund action regarding Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB).

Hedge fund activity in Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB)

Heading into the fourth quarter of 2020, a total of 5 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 67% from the second quarter of 2020. On the other hand, there were a total of 4 hedge funds with a bullish position in TGB a year ago. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were upping their stakes considerably (or already accumulated large positions).

Among these funds, Renaissance Technologies held the most valuable stake in Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB), which was worth $6.2 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was Two Sigma Advisors which amassed $0.5 million worth of shares. Citadel Investment Group, BlueCrest Capital Mgmt., and Millennium 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 Renaissance Technologies allocated the biggest weight to Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB), around 0.01% of its 13F portfolio. BlueCrest Capital Mgmt. is also relatively very bullish on the stock, designating 0.0029 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to TGB.

Consequently, some big names have jumped into Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB) headfirst. BlueCrest Capital Mgmt., managed by Michael Platt and William Reeves, created the most outsized position in Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB). BlueCrest Capital Mgmt. had $0.1 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Israel Englander’s Millennium Management also made a $0 million investment in the stock during the quarter.

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB). These stocks are United Insurance Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:UIHC), West Bancorporation, Inc. (NASDAQ:WTBA), G. Willi-Food International Limited (NASDAQ:WILC), Genius Brands International, Inc. (NASDAQ:GNUS), Cabaletta Bio, Inc. (NASDAQ:CABA), NantHealth, Inc. (NASDAQ:NH), and Northwest Pipe Company (NASDAQ:NWPX). All of these stocks’ market caps are similar to TGB’s market cap.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 5.7 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $25 million. That figure was $7 million in TGB’s case. Northwest Pipe Company (NASDAQ:NWPX) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Genius Brands International, Inc. (NASDAQ:GNUS) is the least popular one with only 2 bullish hedge fund positions. Taseko Mines Limited (NYSE:TGB) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for TGB is 44.5. 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 negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 41.3% in 2019 and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 10 percentage points. These stocks gained 30.7% in 2020 through November 27th and surpassed the market again by 16.1 percentage points. Unfortunately TGB wasn’t nearly as popular as these 20 stocks (hedge fund sentiment was quite bearish); TGB investors were disappointed as the stock returned -11.3% since the end of September (through 11/27) and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 20 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.