Is VICR A Good Stock To Buy According To Hedge Funds?

The Insider Monkey team has completed processing the quarterly 13F filings for the September quarter submitted by the hedge funds and other money managers included in our extensive database. Most hedge fund investors experienced strong gains on the back of a strong market performance, which certainly propelled them to adjust their equity holdings so as to maintain the desired risk profile. As a result, the relevancy of these public filings and their content is indisputable, as they may reveal numerous high-potential stocks. The following article will discuss the smart money sentiment towards Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR).

Is VICR a good stock to buy? Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR) investors should pay attention to an increase in enthusiasm from smart money lately. Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR) was in 20 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of September. The all time high for this statistic is 19. This means the bullish number of hedge fund positions in this stock currently sits at its all time high. Our calculations also showed that VICR 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.

Hedge funds’ reputation as shrewd investors has been tarnished in the last decade as their hedged returns couldn’t keep up with the unhedged returns of the market indices. Our research was able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by more than 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.

Noam Gottesman of GLG Partners

At Insider Monkey we leave no stone unturned when looking for the next great investment idea. For example, the House passed a landmark bill decriminalizing marijuana. So, we are checking out this under the radar cannabis stock right now. We go through lists like the 15 best blue chip stocks to buy 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. With all of this in mind we’re going to take a look at the key hedge fund action regarding Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR).

Do Hedge Funds Think VICR Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?

At the end of September, a total of 20 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of 5% from the second quarter of 2020. The graph below displays the number of hedge funds with bullish position in VICR over the last 21 quarters. So, let’s check out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

More specifically, Driehaus Capital was the largest shareholder of Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR), with a stake worth $26.3 million reported as of the end of September. Trailing Driehaus Capital was PEAK6 Capital Management, which amassed a stake valued at $12.8 million. Trellus Management Company, Alight Capital, and G2 Investment Partners Management were also very fond of the stock, becoming one of the largest hedge fund holders of the company. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Trellus Management Company allocated the biggest weight to Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR), around 10.35% of its 13F portfolio. Alight Capital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 3.45 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to VICR.

Now, key money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. GLG Partners, managed by Noam Gottesman, created the largest position in Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR). GLG Partners had $2.9 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Mika Toikka’s AlphaCrest Capital Management also made a $1.5 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new VICR investors: Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital, Michael Gelband’s ExodusPoint Capital, and Donald Sussman’s Paloma Partners.

Let’s now take a look at hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR) but similarly valued. We will take a look at ASGN Incorporated (NYSE:ASGN), Western Midstream Partners, LP (NYSE:WES), frontdoor, inc. (NASDAQ:FTDR), Scientific Games Corp (NASDAQ:SGMS), Ardagh Group S.A. (NYSE:ARD), I-Mab (NASDAQ:IMAB), and Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX). This group of stocks’ market caps resemble VICR’s market cap.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 21.7 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $369 million. That figure was $75 million in VICR’s case. Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Ardagh Group S.A. (NYSE:ARD) is the least popular one with only 7 bullish hedge fund positions. Vicor Corp (NASDAQ:VICR) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for VICR is 55.7. 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 30.7% in 2020 through December 14th and beat the market by 15.8 percentage points. A small number of hedge funds were also right about betting on VICR, though not to the same extent, as the stock returned 9% since the end of Q3 (through December 14th) and outperformed the market.

Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.