In this article we will take a look at whether hedge funds think Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN) is a good investment right now. We check hedge fund and billionaire investor sentiment before delving into hours of research. Hedge funds spend millions of dollars on Ivy League graduates, unconventional data sources, expert networks, and get tips from investment bankers and industry insiders. Sure they sometimes fail miserably, but their consensus stock picks historically outperformed the market after adjusting for known risk factors.
Is RGEN a good stock to buy now? Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN) was in 35 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of September. The all time high for this statistic is 34. This means the bullish number of hedge fund positions in this stock currently sits at its all time high. RGEN investors should be aware of an increase in hedge fund interest recently. There were 34 hedge funds in our database with RGEN positions at the end of the second quarter. Our calculations also showed that RGEN isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings and see the video for a quick look at the top 5 stocks).
Video: 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 a select group of hedge fund holdings outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by 66 percentage points since March 2017 (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 13% through November 17th. That’s why we believe hedge fund sentiment is an extremely useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.
Ian Wace of Marshall Wace
At Insider Monkey we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, Federal Reserve has been creating trillions of dollars electronically to keep the interest rates near zero. We believe this will lead to inflation and boost real estate prices. So, we recommended this real estate stock to our monthly premium newsletter subscribers. We go through lists like the 15 best blue chip stocks to pick the best large-cap stocks to buy. Even though we recommend positions in only a tiny fraction of the companies we analyze, we check out as many stocks as we can. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. You can subscribe to our free daily newsletter on our website. Now let’s view the fresh hedge fund action surrounding Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN).
Do Hedge Funds Think RGEN Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?
Heading into the fourth quarter of 2020, a total of 35 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 3% from the second quarter of 2020. By comparison, 26 hedge funds held shares or bullish call options in RGEN a year ago. With hedgies’ capital changing hands, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes significantly (or already accumulated large positions).
According to Insider Monkey’s hedge fund database, Robert Joseph Caruso’s Select Equity Group has the number one position in Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN), worth close to $183.8 million, corresponding to 0.9% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is 12 West Capital Management, managed by Joel Ramin, which holds a $162.6 million position; the fund has 7.9% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other peers with similar optimism comprise Paul Marshall and Ian Wace’s Marshall Wace LLP, Renaissance Technologies and Steve Cohen’s Point72 Asset Management. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position 12 West Capital Management allocated the biggest weight to Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN), around 7.91% of its 13F portfolio. Miura Global Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 1.71 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to RGEN.
As one would reasonably expect, some big names were breaking ground themselves. Holocene Advisors, managed by Brandon Haley, created the most valuable position in Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN). Holocene Advisors had $42.6 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Greg Eisner’s Engineers Gate Manager also initiated a $2 million position during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new RGEN investors: Jinghua Yan’s TwinBeech Capital, Qing Li’s Sciencast Management, and Ran Pang’s Quantamental Technologies.
Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN). We will take a look at Wynn Resorts, Limited (NASDAQ:WYNN), Mobile TeleSystems Public Joint Stock Company (NYSE:MBT), XPO Logistics Inc (NYSE:XPO), AGNC Investment Corp. (NASDAQ:AGNC), Iron Mountain Incorporated (NYSE:IRM), Magellan Midstream Partners, L.P. (NYSE:MMP), and Amedisys Inc (NASDAQ:AMED). All of these stocks’ market caps resemble RGEN’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| WYNN | 43 | 510257 | -2 |
| MBT | 10 | 311140 | -1 |
| XPO | 39 | 2338039 | -1 |
| AGNC | 32 | 382410 | -5 |
| IRM | 25 | 112125 | 3 |
| MMP | 20 | 101183 | 5 |
| AMED | 31 | 343564 | 1 |
| Average | 28.6 | 585531 | 0 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 28.6 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $586 million. That figure was $982 million in RGEN’s case. Wynn Resorts, Limited (NASDAQ:WYNN) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Mobile TeleSystems Public Joint Stock Company (NYSE:MBT) is the least popular one with only 10 bullish hedge fund positions. Repligen Corporation (NASDAQ:RGEN) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for RGEN is 73.9. Stocks with higher number of hedge fund positions relative to other stocks as well as relative to their historical range receive a higher sentiment score. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 41.3% in 2019 and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 10 percentage points. These stocks gained 33.3% in 2020 through December 18th and still beat the market by 16.4 percentage points. Hedge funds were also right about betting on RGEN as the stock returned 31.4% since the end of Q3 (through 12/18) and outperformed the market. Hedge funds were rewarded for their relative bullishness.
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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
