Oaktree Capital Group LLC (OAK): Are Hedge Funds Right About This Stock?

Is Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK) a good investment today? Money managers are taking a bullish view. The number of bullish hedge fund bets rose by 2 in recent months.

At the moment, there are many gauges market participants can use to track publicly traded companies. Some of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading movement. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the top money managers can outpace their index-focused peers by a very impressive margin (see just how much).

Equally as important, bullish insider trading sentiment is another way to parse down the financial markets. Just as you’d expect, there are lots of incentives for a bullish insider to get rid of shares of his or her company, but only one, very simple reason why they would buy. Many academic studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this method if “monkeys” understand what to do (learn more here).

Now, we’re going to take a gander at the recent action surrounding Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK).

How are hedge funds trading Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK)?

In preparation for this quarter, a total of 15 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 15% from one quarter earlier. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were upping their stakes significantly.

When looking at the hedgies we track, Hawkins Capital, managed by Russell Hawkins, holds the most valuable position in Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK). Hawkins Capital has a $153.1 million position in the stock, comprising 16.9% of its 13F portfolio. Coming in second is Greenlight Capital, managed by David Einhorn, which held a $94.5 million position; the fund has 1.4% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other hedge funds that hold long positions include Andrew Spokes’s Farallon Capital, Chuck Royce’s Royce & Associates and Curtis Schenker and Craig Effron’s Scoggin.

As industrywide interest jumped, specific money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. FrontFour Capital Group, managed by Stephen Loukas, David A. Lorber, Zachary George, established the largest position in Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK). FrontFour Capital Group had 5.5 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies also made a $4.2 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with brand new OAK positions are Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management and Robert B. Gillam’s McKinley Capital Management.

How are insiders trading Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK)?

Insider trading activity, especially when it’s bullish, is most useful when the company in question has experienced transactions within the past half-year. Over the last half-year time period, Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK) has seen zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s go over hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK). These stocks are Northern Trust Corporation (NASDAQ:NTRS), Invesco Ltd. (NYSE:IVZ), Affiliated Managers Group, Inc. (NYSE:AMG), Principal Financial Group Inc (NYSE:PFG), and Carlyle Group LP (NASDAQ:CG). All of these stocks are in the asset management industry and their market caps match OAK’s market cap.

With the returns demonstrated by Insider Monkey’s time-tested strategies, everyday investors should always watch hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Oaktree Capital Group LLC (NYSE:OAK) is an important part of this process.

Click here to learn why you should track hedge funds