After several tireless days we have finished crunching the numbers from nearly 750 13F filings issued by the elite hedge funds and other investment firms that we track at Insider Monkey, which disclosed those firms’ equity portfolios as of March 31. The results of that effort will be put on display in this article, as we share valuable insight into the smart money sentiment towards Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO).
Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO) shares haven’t seen a lot of action during the first quarter. Overall, hedge fund sentiment was unchanged. The stock was in 17 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the first quarter of 2019. At the end of this article we will also compare AGRO to other stocks including Columbus McKinnon Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCO), Innovative Industrial Properties, Inc. (NYSE:IIPR), and CIM Commercial Trust Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCT) to get a better sense of its popularity.
According to most traders, hedge funds are perceived as worthless, old investment tools of years past. While there are greater than 8000 funds trading today, Our researchers hone in on the elite of this group, around 750 funds. These investment experts direct bulk of all hedge funds’ total asset base, and by tailing their unrivaled stock picks, Insider Monkey has determined several investment strategies that have historically outrun Mr. Market. Insider Monkey’s flagship hedge fund strategy outrun the S&P 500 index by around 5 percentage points annually since its inception in May 2014 through June 18th. We were able to generate large returns even by identifying short candidates. Our portfolio of short stocks lost 28.2% since February 2017 (through June 18th) even though the market was up nearly 30% during the same period. We just shared a list of 5 short targets in our latest quarterly update and they are already down an average of 8.2% in a month whereas our long picks outperformed the market by 2.5 percentage points in this volatile 5 week period (our long picks also beat the market by 15 percentage points so far this year).
Let’s go over the new hedge fund action encompassing Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO).
Hedge fund activity in Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO)
Heading into the second quarter of 2019, a total of 17 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of 0% from the fourth quarter of 2018. By comparison, 19 hedge funds held shares or bullish call options in AGRO a year ago. With the smart money’s capital changing hands, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes meaningfully (or already accumulated large positions).
More specifically, Route One Investment Company was the largest shareholder of Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO), with a stake worth $74.7 million reported as of the end of March. Trailing Route One Investment Company was EMS Capital, which amassed a stake valued at $71 million. Point72 Asset Management, Point72 Asset Management, and D E Shaw were also very fond of the stock, giving the stock large weights in their portfolios.
Judging by the fact that Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO) has faced falling interest from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, we can see that there exists a select few hedgies that decided to sell off their entire stakes in the third quarter. Intriguingly, Zach Schreiber’s Point State Capital dropped the biggest position of all the hedgies tracked by Insider Monkey, valued at about $8.8 million in stock. Andrew Feldstein and Stephen Siderow’s fund, Blue Mountain Capital, also sold off its stock, about $0.2 million worth. These bearish behaviors are important to note, as aggregate hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).
Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO) but similarly valued. These stocks are Columbus McKinnon Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCO), Innovative Industrial Properties, Inc. (NYSE:IIPR), CIM Commercial Trust Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCT), and Summit Midstream Partners LP (NYSE:SMLP). All of these stocks’ market caps match AGRO’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| CMCO | 21 | 61028 | -4 |
| IIPR | 9 | 18482 | 1 |
| CMCT | 1 | 223 | 0 |
| SMLP | 2 | 3637 | -1 |
| Average | 8.25 | 20843 | -1 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 8.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $21 million. That figure was $185 million in AGRO’s case. Columbus McKinnon Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCO) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand CIM Commercial Trust Corporation (NASDAQ:CMCT) is the least popular one with only 1 bullish hedge fund positions. Adecoagro SA (NYSE:AGRO) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. 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 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 6.2% in Q2 through June 19th and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by nearly 3 percentage points. Unfortunately AGRO wasn’t nearly as popular as these 20 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on AGRO were disappointed as the stock returned 2.9% during the same period 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 13 of these stocks already outperformed the market so far in Q2.
Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
