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 752 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. In this article we look at what those investors think of Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC).
Is Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC) a buy right now? Investors who are in the know are getting more bullish. The number of long hedge fund positions increased by 1 lately. Our calculations also showed that WNC isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings and see the video below for Q2 rankings). WNC was in 16 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of September. There were 15 hedge funds in our database with WNC holdings at the end of the previous quarter.
Video: Click the image to watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.
To most investors, hedge funds are viewed as worthless, outdated investment tools of the past. While there are more than 8000 funds in operation at the moment, Our researchers choose to focus on the upper echelon of this club, approximately 750 funds. These hedge fund managers have their hands on the majority of the hedge fund industry’s total asset base, and by watching their finest equity investments, Insider Monkey has discovered a number of investment strategies that have historically outstripped Mr. Market. Insider Monkey’s flagship short hedge fund strategy outstripped the S&P 500 short ETFs by around 20 percentage points per annum since its inception in May 2014. Our portfolio of short stocks lost 27.8% since February 2017 (through November 21st) even though the market was up more than 39% during the same period. We just shared a list of 7 short targets in our latest quarterly update .
Chuck Royce of Royce & Associates
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. One of the most bullish analysts in America just put his money where his mouth is. He says, “I’m investing more today than I did back in early 2009.” So we check out his pitch. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. We also rely on the best performing hedge funds‘ buy/sell signals. We’re going to take a look at the new hedge fund action regarding Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC).
What does smart money think about Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC)?
At Q3’s end, a total of 16 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 7% from the second quarter of 2019. On the other hand, there were a total of 13 hedge funds with a bullish position in WNC 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 Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC) was held by Renaissance Technologies, which reported holding $23.4 million worth of stock at the end of September. It was followed by Royce & Associates with a $11.5 million position. Other investors bullish on the company included Citadel Investment Group, D E Shaw, and GLG Partners. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Royce & Associates allocated the biggest weight to Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC), around 0.11% of its 13F portfolio. Magnetar Capital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 0.03 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to WNC.
Consequently, key money managers have been driving this bullishness. Arrowstreet Capital, managed by Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell, initiated the biggest position in Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC). Arrowstreet Capital had $2.4 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Michael Gelband’s ExodusPoint Capital also initiated a $0.3 million position during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new WNC investors: Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group and Paul Marshall and Ian Wace’s Marshall Wace.
Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC). We will take a look at Opus Bank (NASDAQ:OPB), Pacific Biosciences of California, Inc. (NASDAQ:PACB), INTL Fcstone Inc (NASDAQ:INTL), and Ingles Markets, Incorporated (NASDAQ:IMKTA). This group of stocks’ market values resemble WNC’s market value.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| OPB | 8 | 127185 | -1 |
| PACB | 23 | 132095 | 1 |
| INTL | 10 | 92507 | -1 |
| IMKTA | 12 | 59791 | -1 |
| Average | 13.25 | 102895 | -0.5 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 13.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $103 million. That figure was $59 million in WNC’s case. Pacific Biosciences of California, Inc. (NASDAQ:PACB) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Opus Bank (NASDAQ:OPB) is the least popular one with only 8 bullish hedge fund positions. Wabash National Corporation (NYSE:WNC) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 37.4% in 2019 through the end of November and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 9.9 percentage points. Hedge funds were also right about betting on WNC, though not to the same extent, as the stock returned 9.2% during the first two months of the fourth quarter and outperformed the market as well.
Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
