The latest 13F reporting period has come and gone, and Insider Monkey is again at the forefront when it comes to making use of this gold mine of data. We have processed the filings of the more than 873 world-class investment firms that we track and now have access to the collective wisdom contained in these filings, which are based on their June 30th holdings, data that is available nowhere else. Should you consider Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN) for your portfolio? We’ll look to this invaluable collective wisdom for the answer.
Is Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN) an outstanding investment right now? Prominent investors were in a bullish mood. The number of long hedge fund positions moved up by 6 lately. Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN) was in 19 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of June. The all time high for this statistic is 20. Our calculations also showed that CCRN isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q2 rankings). There were 13 hedge funds in our database with CCRN holdings at the end of March.
Hedge funds’ reputation as shrewd investors has been tarnished in the last decade as their hedged returns couldn’t keep up with the unhedged returns of the market indices. Hedge funds have more than $3.5 trillion in assets under management, so you can’t expect their entire portfolios to beat the market by large margins. Our research was able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by more than 79 percentage points since March 2017 (see the details here). So you can still find a lot of gems by following hedge funds’ moves today.
Richard Driehaus of Driehaus Capital
Keeping this in mind we’re going to take a glance at the recent hedge fund action regarding Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN).
Do Hedge Funds Think CCRN Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?
At the end of the second quarter, a total of 19 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of 46% from one quarter earlier. By comparison, 12 hedge funds held shares or bullish call options in CCRN a year ago. With the smart money’s capital changing hands, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings significantly (or already accumulated large positions).
Among these funds, Royce & Associates held the most valuable stake in Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN), which was worth $25.2 million at the end of the second quarter. On the second spot was Driehaus Capital which amassed $9.5 million worth of shares. Sio Capital, AQR Capital Management, and Arrowstreet Capital were also very fond of the stock, becoming one of the largest hedge fund holders of the company. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Zebra Capital Management allocated the biggest weight to Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN), around 2.11% of its 13F portfolio. Sio Capital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 1.15 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to CCRN.
As aggregate interest increased, key hedge funds were leading the bulls’ herd. Driehaus Capital, managed by Richard Driehaus, established the most outsized position in Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN). Driehaus Capital had $9.5 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group also initiated a $1.7 million position during the quarter. The other funds with brand new CCRN positions are Michael Gelband’s ExodusPoint Capital, Kamran Moghtaderi’s Eversept Partners, and Bruce Kovner’s Caxton Associates LP.
Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN). These stocks are Insteel Industries Inc (NASDAQ:IIIN), Glatfelter Corp (NYSE:GLT), CarLotz, Inc. (NASDAQ:LOTZ), Uranium Energy Corp. (NYSE:UEC), Luther Burbank Corporation (NASDAQ:LBC), SOS Limited (NYSE:SOS), and Pharvaris N.V. (NASDAQ:PHVS). This group of stocks’ market values are closest to CCRN’s market value.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| IIIN | 10 | 26062 | -2 |
| GLT | 12 | 44990 | 4 |
| LOTZ | 16 | 48006 | -3 |
| UEC | 14 | 9062 | 7 |
| LBC | 6 | 6983 | 0 |
| SOS | 3 | 2096 | -3 |
| PHVS | 8 | 83438 | -3 |
| Average | 9.9 | 31520 | 0 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 9.9 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $32 million. That figure was $62 million in CCRN’s case. CarLotz, Inc. (NASDAQ:LOTZ) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand SOS Limited (NYSE:SOS) is the least popular one with only 3 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks Cross Country Healthcare, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCRN) is more popular among hedge funds. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for CCRN is 88.5. 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 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 95.8% in 2019 and 2020, and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 40 percentage points. These stocks returned 24% in 2021 through October 22nd but still managed to beat the market by 1.6 percentage points. Hedge funds were also right about betting on CCRN as the stock returned 20.5% since the end of June (through 10/22) and outperformed the market by an even larger margin. Hedge funds were clearly right about piling into this stock relative to other stocks with similar market capitalizations.
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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
