At Insider Monkey, we pore over the filings of nearly 887 top investment firms every quarter, a process we have now completed for the latest reporting period. The data we’ve gathered as a result gives us access to a wealth of collective knowledge based on these firms’ portfolio holdings as of December 31st. In this article, we will use that wealth of knowledge to determine whether or not Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. (NYSE:WPM) makes for a good investment right now.
Is WPM stock a buy? Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. (NYSE:WPM) has experienced an increase in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds recently. Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. (NYSE:WPM) was in 34 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of December. The all time high for this statistic is 30. This means the bullish number of hedge fund positions in this stock currently sits at its all time high. There were 29 hedge funds in our database with WPM positions at the end of the third quarter. Our calculations also showed that WPM isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q4 rankings).
Eric Sprott of Sprott Asset Management
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Do Hedge Funds Think WPM Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?
At fourth quarter’s end, a total of 34 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of 17% from the previous quarter. The graph below displays the number of hedge funds with bullish position in WPM over the last 22 quarters. So, let’s review which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.
More specifically, Arrowstreet Capital was the largest shareholder of Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. (NYSE:WPM), with a stake worth $201.4 million reported as of the end of December. Trailing Arrowstreet Capital was Renaissance Technologies, which amassed a stake valued at $109 million. Horizon Asset Management, Citadel Investment Group, and Sprott Asset 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 Kopernik Global Investors allocated the biggest weight to Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. (NYSE:WPM), around 6.69% of its 13F portfolio. Moerus Capital Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, earmarking 5.05 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to WPM.
There weren’t any hedge funds initiating brand new positions in the stock during the fourth quarter.
Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. (NYSE:WPM) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Expedia Group Inc (NASDAQ:EXPE), Pioneer Natural Resources Company (NYSE:PXD), Hologic, Inc. (NASDAQ:HOLX), PagSeguro Digital Ltd. (NYSE:PAGS), Check Point Software Technologies Ltd. (NASDAQ:CHKP), SS&C Technologies Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:SSNC), and Restaurant Brands International Inc (NYSE:QSR). All of these stocks’ market caps resemble WPM’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| EXPE | 76 | 6594558 | 12 |
| PXD | 40 | 685798 | -2 |
| HOLX | 43 | 715967 | -7 |
| PAGS | 25 | 1840597 | 1 |
| CHKP | 26 | 775145 | -1 |
| SSNC | 49 | 2623844 | -5 |
| QSR | 39 | 2406995 | 6 |
| Average | 42.6 | 2234701 | 0.6 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 42.6 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $2235 million. That figure was $755 million in WPM’s case. Expedia Group Inc (NASDAQ:EXPE) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand PagSeguro Digital Ltd. (NYSE:PAGS) is the least popular one with only 25 bullish hedge fund positions. Wheaton Precious Metals Corp. (NYSE:WPM) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for WPM is 48.8. 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. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. Our calculations showed that top 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 81.2% in 2019 and 2020, and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 26 percentage points. These stocks gained 7.9% in 2021 through April 1st and surpassed the market again by 0.4 percentage points. Unfortunately WPM wasn’t nearly as popular as these 30 stocks (hedge fund sentiment was quite bearish); WPM investors were disappointed as the stock returned -4.1% since the end of December (through 4/1) and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds as most of these stocks already outperformed the market in 2020.
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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
