Hedge funds and other investment firms run by legendary investors like Israel Englander and Ray Dalio are entrusted to manage billions of dollars of accredited investors’ money because they are without peer in the resources they use to identify the best investments for their chosen investment horizon. Moreover, they are more willing to invest a greater amount of their resources in small-cap stocks than big brokerage houses, and this is often where they generate their outperformance, which is why we pay particular attention to their best ideas in this space.
In this article, we are going to discuss LIBERTY GLOBAL PLC (NASDAQ:LBTYK), in which 56 funds tracked by Insider Monkey held shares at the end of September. LBTYK investors should be aware of a decrease in hedge fund interest, as there had been 60 funds with LBTYK positions at the end of the previous quarter. At the end of this article, we will also compare LBTYK to other stocks including Manulife Financial Corporation (USA) (NYSE:MFC), Equinix Inc (NASDAQ:EQIX), and eBay Inc (NASDAQ:EBAY) to get a better sense of its popularity.
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At Insider Monkey, we’ve developed an investment strategy that has delivered market-beating returns over the past 12 months. Our strategy identifies the 100 best-performing funds of the previous quarter from among the collection of 700+ successful funds that we track in our database, which we accomplish using our returns methodology. We then study the portfolios of those 100 funds using the latest 13F data to uncover the 30 most popular mid-cap stocks (market caps of between $1 billion and $10 billion) among them to hold until the next filing period. This strategy delivered 18% gains over the past 12 months, more than doubling the 8% returns enjoyed by the S&P 500 ETFs.
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Now, let’s view the new action regarding LIBERTY GLOBAL PLC (NASDAQ:LBTYK).
How have hedgies been trading LIBERTY GLOBAL PLC (NASDAQ:LBTYK)?
During the third quarter, the number of investors from our database long LBTYK declined by 7% to 56. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were upping their stakes considerably (or already accumulated large positions).
According to Insider Monkey’s hedge fund database, Boykin Curry’s Eagle Capital Management has the largest position in LIBERTY GLOBAL PLC (NASDAQ:LBTYK), worth close to $1.1923 billion, corresponding to 5.1% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by John H. Scully’s SPO Advisory Corp, which disclosed a $944.6 million position; the fund has 16.6% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Some other members of the smart money with similar optimism comprise John Ku’s Manor Road Capital Partners, Lou Simpson’s SQ Advisors, and Philippe Laffont’s Coatue Management.
Seeing as LIBERTY GLOBAL PLC (NASDAQ:LBTYK) has experienced bearish sentiment from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, it’s easy to see that there is a sect of money managers that elected to cut their entire stakes during the third quarter. Interestingly, First Eagle Investment Management cut the largest investment of the “upper crust” of funds followed by Insider Monkey, totaling about $435.4 million in stock. Peter Adam Hochfelder’s fund, Brahman Capital, also cut its stock, about $131.2 million worth.
Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to LIBERTY GLOBAL PLC (NASDAQ:LBTYK). These stocks are Manulife Financial Corporation (USA) (NYSE:MFC), Equinix Inc (NASDAQ:EQIX), eBay Inc (NASDAQ:EBAY), and NXP Semiconductors NV (NASDAQ:NXPI). This group of stocks’ market caps match LBTYK’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| MFC | 13 | 197047 | -3 |
| EQIX | 42 | 2131549 | 1 |
| EBAY | 53 | 3708761 | -5 |
| NXPI | 78 | 2623678 | 21 |
As you can see these stocks had an average of 47 investors holding shares and the average amount invested in these stocks was $2.17 billion. That figure was $5.71 billion in LBTYK’s case. NXP Semiconductors NV (NASDAQ:NXPI) is the most popular stock in this table with 78 funds holding shares. On the other hand Manulife Financial Corporation (USA) (NYSE:MFC) is the least popular one with only 13 bullish hedge fund positions. LIBERTY GLOBAL PLC (NASDAQ:LBTYK) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. This is a slightly positive signal but we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard NXP Semiconductors NV (NASDAQ:NXPI) might be a better candidate to consider a long position.
