We at Insider Monkey have gone over 752 13F filings that hedge funds and prominent investors are required to file by the SEC The 13F filings show the funds’ and investors’ portfolio positions as of September 30th. In this article, we look at what those funds think of Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND) based on that data.
Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND) shares haven’t seen a lot of action during the third quarter. Overall, hedge fund sentiment was unchanged. The stock was in 7 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2019. At the end of this article we will also compare MLND to other stocks including NCS Multistage Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCSM), Great Elm Capital Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:GEC), and Cyren Ltd (NASDAQ:CYRN) to get a better sense of its popularity.
Video: Click the image to watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.
In the financial world there are a large number of tools investors have at their disposal to grade stocks. A pair of the most under-the-radar tools are hedge fund and insider trading indicators. We have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the best fund managers can outperform the broader indices by a solid amount. Insider Monkey’s flagship best performing hedge funds strategy returned 91% since May 2014 and outperformed the Russell 2000 ETFs by nearly 40 percentage points. Our short strategy outperformed the S&P 500 short ETFs by 20 percentage points annually (see the details here). That’s why we believe hedge fund sentiment is a useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.
Steven Cohen of Point72 Asset Management
We leave no stone unturned when looking for the next great investment idea. For example Discover is offering this insane cashback card, so we look into shorting the stock. One of the most bullish analysts in America just put his money where his mouth is. He says, “I’m investing more today than I did back in early 2009.” So we check out his pitch. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. We even check out this option genius’ weekly trade ideas. This December, we recommended Adams Energy as a one-way bet based on an under-the-radar fund manager’s investor letter and the stock already gained 20 percent. Now we’re going to analyze the key hedge fund action regarding Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND).
How are hedge funds trading Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND)?
At the end of the third quarter, a total of 7 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of 0% from one quarter earlier. The graph below displays the number of hedge funds with bullish position in MLND over the last 17 quarters. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists a few key hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings significantly (or already accumulated large positions).
When looking at the institutional investors followed by Insider Monkey, Frazier Healthcare Partners, managed by Alan Frazier, holds the biggest position in Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND). Frazier Healthcare Partners has a $9.9 million position in the stock, comprising 3.1% of its 13F portfolio. On Frazier Healthcare Partners’s heels is Jeffrey Jay and David Kroin of Great Point Partners, with a $9.2 million position; the fund has 0.8% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining peers with similar optimism encompass Renaissance Technologies, Srini Akkaraju and Michael Dybbs’s Samsara BioCapital and Steve Cohen’s Point72 Asset Management. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Frazier Healthcare Partners allocated the biggest weight to Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND), around 3.1% of its 13F portfolio. Samsara BioCapital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, dishing out 0.9 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to MLND.
Earlier we told you that the aggregate hedge fund interest in the stock was unchanged and we view this as a negative development. Even though there weren’t any hedge funds dumping their holdings during the third quarter, there weren’t any hedge funds initiating brand new positions. This indicates that hedge funds, at the very best, perceive this stock as dead money and they haven’t identified any viable catalysts that can attract investor attention.
Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND) but similarly valued. These stocks are NCS Multistage Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:NCSM), Great Elm Capital Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:GEC), Cyren Ltd (NASDAQ:CYRN), and Navios Maritime Acquisition Corp (NYSE:NNA). This group of stocks’ market caps are similar to MLND’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| NCSM | 4 | 528 | 0 |
| GEC | 8 | 30835 | 1 |
| CYRN | 2 | 1888 | 0 |
| NNA | 2 | 2384 | 0 |
| Average | 4 | 8909 | 0.25 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 4 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $9 million. That figure was $23 million in MLND’s case. Great Elm Capital Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:GEC) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Cyren Ltd (NASDAQ:CYRN) is the least popular one with only 2 bullish hedge fund positions. Millendo Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:MLND) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 37.4% in 2019 through the end of November and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 9.9 percentage points. Hedge funds were also right about betting on MLND, though not to the same extent, as the stock returned 7% during the first two months of the fourth quarter and outperformed the market as well.
Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
