Is RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS) ready to rally soon? The smart money is betting on the stock. The number of long hedge fund positions increased by 1 lately.
To the average investor, there are plenty of metrics market participants can use to watch their holdings. Some of the most under-the-radar are hedge fund and insider trading activity. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the best fund managers can outclass their index-focused peers by a solid margin (see just how much).
Just as important, bullish insider trading activity is another way to break down the investments you’re interested in. Just as you’d expect, there are many reasons for an insider to cut shares of his or her company, but just one, very clear reason why they would behave bullishly. Various academic studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this method if “monkeys” know where to look (learn more here).
Keeping this in mind, it’s important to take a glance at the recent action surrounding RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS).
What does the smart money think about RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS)?
Heading into Q2, a total of 12 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 9% from one quarter earlier. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists an “upper tier” of key hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings considerably.
When looking at the hedgies we track, Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies had the largest position in RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS), worth close to $6.1 million, comprising less than 0.1%% of its total 13F portfolio. Coming in second is Chuck Royce of Royce & Associates, with a $5.7 million position; less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Other hedge funds that hold long positions include Jacob Gottlieb’s Visium Asset Management, Israel Englander’s Millennium Management and Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management.
With a general bullishness amongst the heavyweights, some big names have been driving this bullishness. Visium Asset Management, managed by Jacob Gottlieb, established the most outsized position in RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS). Visium Asset Management had 5 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management also initiated a $3.4 million position during the quarter. The other funds with brand new RAS positions are Steven Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors and Mike Vranos’s Ellington.
How are insiders trading RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS)?
Insider buying is at its handiest when the primary stock in question has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the last six-month time period, RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS) has experienced 1 unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
Let’s also take a look at hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to RAIT Financial Trust (NYSE:RAS). These stocks are One Liberty Properties, Inc. (NYSE:OLP), AG Mortgage Investment Trust Inc (NYSE:MITT), Excel Trust Inc (NYSE:EXL), Apollo Commercial Real Est. Finance Inc (NYSE:ARI), and Winthrop Realty Trust (NYSE:FUR). This group of stocks are the members of the reit – diversified industry and their market caps are closest to RAS’s market cap.
