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. Insider Monkey finished processing more than 730 13F filings submitted by hedge funds and prominent investors. These filings show these funds’ portfolio positions as of June 28th, 2019. In this article we are going to take a look at smart money sentiment towards Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL).
Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL) investors should pay attention to a decrease in support from the world’s most elite money managers lately. GHL was in 11 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the second quarter of 2019. There were 15 hedge funds in our database with GHL positions at the end of the previous quarter. Our calculations also showed that GHL isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (see the video below).
Video: Click the image to 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 hedge funds’ large-cap stock picks indeed failed to beat the market between 1999 and 2016. However, we were able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that outperformed the market by 40 percentage points since May 2014 through May 30, 2019 (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 25.7% through September 30, 2019. That’s why we believe hedge fund sentiment is an extremely useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.
In addition to following the biggest hedge funds for investment ideas, we also share stock pitches from conferences, investor letters and other sources like this one where the fund manager is talking about two under the radar 1000% return potential stocks: first one in internet infrastructure and the second in the heart of advertising market. We use hedge fund buy/sell signals to determine whether to conduct in-depth analysis of these stock ideas which take days. Let’s take a look at the recent hedge fund action surrounding Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL).
What have hedge funds been doing with Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL)?
At the end of the second quarter, a total of 11 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of -27% from the first quarter of 2019. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards GHL over the last 16 quarters. So, let’s examine which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.
More specifically, Fisher Asset Management was the largest shareholder of Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL), with a stake worth $7.3 million reported as of the end of March. Trailing Fisher Asset Management was Citadel Investment Group, which amassed a stake valued at $2.4 million. Renaissance Technologies, Ancora Advisors, and Miller Value Partners were also very fond of the stock, giving the stock large weights in their portfolios.
Seeing as Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL) has witnessed bearish sentiment from the aggregate hedge fund industry, we can see that there were a few hedgies that elected to cut their positions entirely last quarter. Interestingly, Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management said goodbye to the biggest investment of the 750 funds followed by Insider Monkey, worth an estimated $2.3 million in stock. Mark Travis’s fund, Intrepid Capital Management, also said goodbye to its stock, about $2.3 million worth. These bearish behaviors are interesting, as total hedge fund interest was cut by 4 funds last quarter.
Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Preformed Line Products Company (NASDAQ:PLPC), Century Casinos, Inc. (NASDAQ:CNTY), Cellular Biomedicine Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CBMG), and Republic First Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:FRBK). This group of stocks’ market values are closest to GHL’s market value.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| PLPC | 5 | 30712 | -2 |
| CNTY | 10 | 60108 | 4 |
| CBMG | 1 | 11123 | -1 |
| FRBK | 6 | 4889 | 0 |
| Average | 5.5 | 26708 | 0.25 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 5.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $27 million. That figure was $16 million in GHL’s case. Century Casinos, Inc. (NASDAQ:CNTY) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Cellular Biomedicine Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:CBMG) is the least popular one with only 1 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL) is more popular among hedge funds. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 24.4% in 2019 through September 30th and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 4 percentage points. Unfortunately GHL wasn’t nearly as popular as these 20 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on GHL were disappointed as the stock returned -3.1% during the third quarter 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 many of these stocks already outperformed the market in Q3.
Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
