Is WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC) a good place to invest some of your money right now? We can gain invaluable insight to help us answer that question by studying the investment trends of top investors, who employ world-class Ivy League graduates, who are given immense resources and industry contacts to put their financial expertise to work. The top picks of these firms have historically outperformed the market when we account for known risk factors, making them very valuable investment ideas.
Is WSC stock a buy? WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC) investors should pay attention to a decrease in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds recently. WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC) was in 35 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the fourth quarter of 2020. The all time high for this statistic is 36. Our calculations also showed that WSC isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q4 rankings).
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 124 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.
Ricky Sandler of Eminence Capital
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 10 best battery stocks to buy to identify the next stock with 10x upside potential. 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 review the latest hedge fund action encompassing WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC).
Do Hedge Funds Think WSC Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?
At fourth quarter’s end, a total of 35 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of -3% from one quarter earlier. The graph below displays the number of hedge funds with bullish position in WSC over the last 22 quarters. So, let’s find out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.
According to Insider Monkey’s hedge fund database, Eminence Capital, managed by Ricky Sandler, holds the largest position in WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC). Eminence Capital has a $181 million position in the stock, comprising 1.7% of its 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Permian Investment Partners, led by Alex Duran and Scott Hendrickson, holding a $120.8 million position; 18.1% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Some other members of the smart money with similar optimism encompass Richard Scott Greeder’s Broad Bay Capital, David Rosen’s Rubric Capital Management and Malcolm Levine’s Dendur Capital. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Permian Investment Partners allocated the biggest weight to WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC), around 18.07% of its 13F portfolio. Yarra Square Partners is also relatively very bullish on the stock, dishing out 14.02 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to WSC.
Since WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC) has faced a decline in interest from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, it’s safe to say that there is a sect of funds that decided to sell off their full holdings heading into Q1. It’s worth mentioning that Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital said goodbye to the biggest stake of all the hedgies watched by Insider Monkey, worth an estimated $31 million in stock. Jay Petschek and Steven Major’s fund, Corsair Capital Management, also cut its stock, about $23.6 million worth. These transactions are important to note, as aggregate hedge fund interest was cut by 1 funds heading into Q1.
Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC). These stocks are MDU Resources Group Inc (NYSE:MDU), Ingredion Incorporated (NYSE:INGR), Marathon Oil Corporation (NYSE:MRO), Primerica, Inc. (NYSE:PRI), Iridium Communications Inc. (NASDAQ:IRDM), Everbridge, Inc. (NASDAQ:EVBG), and Stifel Financial Corp. (NYSE:SF). This group of stocks’ market valuations resemble WSC’s market valuation.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| MDU | 20 | 150898 | -3 |
| INGR | 24 | 419950 | 1 |
| MRO | 26 | 317417 | 10 |
| PRI | 31 | 468219 | -4 |
| IRDM | 18 | 431524 | 3 |
| EVBG | 36 | 1247361 | 6 |
| SF | 18 | 151609 | 0 |
| Average | 24.7 | 455283 | 1.9 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 24.7 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $455 million. That figure was $900 million in WSC’s case. Everbridge, Inc. (NASDAQ:EVBG) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Iridium Communications Inc. (NASDAQ:IRDM) is the least popular one with only 18 bullish hedge fund positions. WillScot Mobile Mini Holdings Corp. (NASDAQ:WSC) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for WSC is 80.4. 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 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 still beat the market by 0.4 percentage points. Hedge funds were also right about betting on WSC as the stock returned 25.1% since the end of Q4 (through 4/1) 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.
