The 700+ hedge funds and money managers tracked by Insider Monkey have already compiled and submitted their 13F filings for the third quarter, which unveil their equity positions as of September 30. We went through these filings, fixed typos and other more significant errors and identified the changes in hedge fund positions. Our extensive review of these public filings is finally over, so this article is set to reveal the smart money sentiment towards Eclipse Resources Corp (NYSE:ECR) .
Eclipse Resources Corp (NYSE:ECR) has experienced a decrease in hedge fund interest recently. ECR was in 18 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2016. There were 24 hedge funds in our database with ECR holdings at the end of the previous quarter. The level and the change in hedge fund popularity aren’t the only variables you need to analyze to decipher hedge funds’ perspectives. A stock may witness a boost in popularity but it may still be less popular than similarly priced stocks. That’s why at the end of this article we will examine companies such as NutriSystem Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRI), Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises Inc (NYSE:BW), and TCP Capital Corp (NASDAQ:TCPC) to gather more data points.
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How have hedgies been trading Eclipse Resources Corp (NYSE:ECR)?
At the end of the third quarter, a total of 18 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a fall of 25% from the previous quarter. The graph below displays the number of hedge funds with bullish position in ECR over the last 5 quarters. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings substantially (or already accumulated large positions).
According to Insider Monkey’s hedge fund database, Viking Global, led by Andreas Halvorsen, holds the number one position in Eclipse Resources Corp (NYSE:ECR). Viking Global has a $24 million position in the stock. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Alyeska Investment Group, led by Anand Parekh, which holds a $11.2 million position. Remaining hedge funds and institutional investors that hold long positions encompass Alec Litowitz and Ross Laser’s Magnetar Capital, Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group and Phil Frohlich’s Prescott Group Capital Management. We should note that none of these hedge funds are among our list of the 100 best performing hedge funds which is based on the performance of their 13F long positions in non-microcap stocks.
Judging by the fact that Eclipse Resources Corp (NYSE:ECR) has gone through a decline in interest from the smart money, we can see that there lies a certain “tier” of fund managers that elected to cut their positions entirely last quarter. It’s worth mentioning that Todd J. Kantor’s Encompass Capital Advisors sold off the largest investment of all the hedgies tracked by Insider Monkey, comprising close to $7.3 million in stock. Michael A. Price and Amos Meron’s fund, Empyrean Capital Partners, also dropped its stock, about $5.7 million worth.
Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Eclipse Resources Corp (NYSE:ECR). These stocks are NutriSystem Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRI), Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises Inc (NYSE:BW), TCP Capital Corp (NASDAQ:TCPC), and Vitamin Shoppe Inc (NYSE:VSI). All of these stocks’ market caps are similar to ECR’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| NTRI | 19 | 152587 | -4 |
| BW | 20 | 198761 | 0 |
| TCPC | 6 | 7938 | -3 |
| VSI | 13 | 132387 | -2 |
As you can see these stocks had an average of 15 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $123 million. That figure was $72 million in ECR’s case. Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises Inc (NYSE:BW) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand TCP Capital Corp (NASDAQ:TCPC) is the least popular one with only 6 bullish hedge fund positions. Eclipse Resources Corp (NYSE:ECR) 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. In this regard BW might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.
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