Is Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC) the right investment to pursue these days? Investors who are in the know are becoming more confident. The number of bullish hedge fund bets inched up by 1 lately.
In today’s marketplace, there are tons of indicators market participants can use to track Mr. Market. A pair of the best are hedge fund and insider trading movement. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the best hedge fund managers can beat the S&P 500 by a healthy margin (see just how much).
Equally as integral, bullish insider trading sentiment is a second way to parse down the marketplace. Just as you’d expect, there are lots of stimuli for a bullish insider to downsize shares of his or her company, but just one, very simple reason why they would behave bullishly. Many empirical studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this method if shareholders understand what to do (learn more here).
Keeping this in mind, let’s take a gander at the recent action regarding Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC).
What have hedge funds been doing with Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC)?
At the end of the fourth quarter, a total of 15 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 7% from the third quarter. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were increasing their holdings considerably.
According to our comprehensive database, Mark Broach’s Manatuck Hill Partners had the most valuable position in Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC), worth close to $24 million, comprising 3.6% of its total 13F portfolio. Coming in second is Brett Hendrickson of Nokomis Capital, with a $10 million position; the fund has 3.4% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other peers with similar optimism include Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies, Abby Flamholz and Yehuda Blinder’s ADAR Investment Management and D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw.
As one would reasonably expect, key money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. McKinley Capital Management, managed by Robert B. Gillam, initiated the most valuable position in Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC). McKinley Capital Management had 2 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group also initiated a $1 million position during the quarter. The only other fund with a brand new CKEC position is Steven Cohen’s SAC Capital Advisors.
What have insiders been doing with Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC)?
Insider trading activity, especially when it’s bullish, is most useful when the primary stock in question has seen transactions within the past 180 days. Over the last 180-day time period, Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC) has experienced 2 unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
Let’s also examine hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC). These stocks are Regal Entertainment Group (NYSE:RGC), Dreamworks Animation Skg Inc (NASDAQ:DWA), Reading International, Inc. (NASDAQ:RDI), RealD (NYSE:RLD), and Rentrak Corporation (NASDAQ:RENT). This group of stocks are in the movie production, theaters industry and their market caps are similar to CKEC’s market cap.
| Company Name | # of Hedge Funds | # of Insiders Buying | # of Insiders Selling |
| Regal Entertainment Group (NYSE:RGC) | 16 | 0 | 0 |
| Dreamworks Animation Skg Inc (NASDAQ:DWA) | 7 | 0 | 4 |
| Reading International, Inc. (NASDAQ:RDI) | 3 | 1 | 1 |
| RealD (NYSE:RLD) | 14 | 0 | 5 |
| Rentrak Corporation (NASDAQ:RENT) | 6 | 0 | 0 |
With the results shown by the aforementioned studies, retail investors should always monitor hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Carmike Cinemas, Inc. (NASDAQ:CKEC) applies perfectly to this mantra.
