Our extensive research has shown that imitating the smart money can generate significant returns for retail investors, which is why we track more than 700 prominent money managers and analyze their quarterly 13F filings. The stocks that are heavily bought by hedge funds historically outperformed the market, though there is no shortage of high profile gigantic failures like hedge funds’ recent losses in Valeant. Let’s take a closer look at what the funds we track think about Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO) in this article.
Is Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO) ready to rally soon? Hedge funds are getting more optimistic. The number of long hedge fund positions advanced by 1 in recent months. At the end of this article we will also compare MRO to other stocks including Xerox Corporation (NYSE:XRX), Textron Inc. (NYSE:TXT), and MGM Resorts International (NYSE:MGM) to get a better sense of its popularity.
Follow Marathon Oil Corp (NYSE:MRO)
Follow Marathon Oil Corp (NYSE:MRO)
Keeping this in mind, we’re going to take a look at the fresh action regarding Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO).
What have hedge funds been doing with Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO)?
At the end of the third quarter, a total of 34 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of 3% from the previous quarter. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of key hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings considerably (or already accumulated large positions).
According to publicly available hedge fund and institutional investor holdings data compiled by Insider Monkey, William B. Gray’s Orbis Investment Management has the largest position in Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO), worth close to $80.4 million, accounting for 0.7% of its total 13F portfolio. On Orbis Investment Management’s heels is Anand Parekh of Alyeska Investment Group, with a $64.2 million position; the fund has 0.8% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining hedge funds and institutional investors that hold long positions encompass Clint Carlson’s Carlson Capital, Cliff Asness’ AQR Capital Management and Todd J. Kantor’s Encompass Capital Advisors.
As industrywide interest jumped, specific money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. Encompass Capital Advisors, managed by Todd J. Kantor, assembled the most outsized position in Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO). Encompass Capital Advisors had $34.6 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Peter Muller’s PDT Partners also made a $19.4 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with brand new MRO positions are Ron Gutfleish’s Elm Ridge Capital, Sander Gerber’s Hudson Bay Capital Management, and Michael Platt and William Reeves’s BlueCrest Capital Mgmt..
Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO). These stocks are Xerox Corporation (NYSE:XRX), Textron Inc. (NYSE:TXT), MGM Resorts International (NYSE:MGM), and Goldcorp Inc. (USA) (NYSE:GG). This group of stocks’ market values are closest to MRO’s market value.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| XRX | 33 | 547895 | 3 |
| TXT | 26 | 688242 | -7 |
| MGM | 49 | 1914535 | -9 |
| GG | 29 | 871283 | 5 |
As you can see these stocks had an average of 34.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $1005 million. That figure was $429 million in MRO’s case. MGM Resorts International (NYSE:MGM) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Textron Inc. (NYSE:TXT) is the least popular one with only 26 bullish hedge fund positions. Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard MGM might be a better candidate to consider a long position.
