Raymond James Financial, Inc. (RJF): Here is What Hedge Funds and Insiders Think About It

In the 21st century investor’s toolkit, there are a multitude of gauges market participants can use to analyze the equity markets. Two of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading activity. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the top investment managers can trounce the market by a very impressive amount (see just how much).

Just as key, optimistic insider trading sentiment is another way to look at the stock market universe. As the old adage goes: there are a variety of incentives for a bullish insider to cut shares of his or her company, but just one, very clear reason why they would behave bullishly. Plenty of empirical studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this strategy if you understand what to do (learn more here).

What’s more, we’re going to analyze the latest info surrounding Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF).

How are hedge funds trading Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF)?

Heading into Q3, a total of 21 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 0% from the first quarter. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists an “upper tier” of key hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings meaningfully.

Out of the hedge funds we follow, Ken Fisher’s Fisher Asset Management had the most valuable position in Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF), worth close to $73.2 million, accounting for 0.2% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Chuck Royce of Royce & Associates, with a $46.4 million position; 0.1% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Some other hedge funds that hold long positions include Gregg J. Powers’s Private Capital Management, Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group and Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies.

Due to the fact Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF) has witnessed dropping sentiment from the top-tier hedge fund industry, it’s easy to see that there was a specific group of hedgies who sold off their positions entirely heading into Q2. It’s worth mentioning that Ben Levine, Andrew Manuel and Stefan Renold’s LMR Partners said goodbye to the largest investment of the 450+ funds we watch, comprising about $13.1 million in stock, and Bruce Kovner of Caxton Associates LP was right behind this move, as the fund dropped about $4.5 million worth. These bearish behaviors are intriguing to say the least, as total hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).

What have insiders been doing with Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF)?

Bullish insider trading is particularly usable when the company in focus has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the last 180-day time period, Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF) has seen zero unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

We’ll also examine the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF). These stocks are Oppenheimer Holdings Inc. (USA) (NYSE:OPY), Knight Capital Group Inc. (NYSE:KCG), Investment Technology Group (NYSE:ITG), Greenhill & Co., Inc. (NYSE:GHL), and Stifel Financial Corp. (NYSE:SF). All of these stocks are in the investment brokerage – regional industry and their market caps are similar to RJF’s market cap.

Using the results explained by the previously mentioned tactics, regular investors should always track hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Raymond James Financial, Inc. (NYSE:RJF) is no exception.

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