A whopping number of 13F filings filed with U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has been processed by Insider Monkey so that individual investors can look at the overall hedge fund sentiment towards the stocks included in their watchlists. These freshly-submitted public filings disclose money managers’ equity positions as of the end of the three-month period that ended September 30, so let’s proceed with the discussion of the hedge fund sentiment on VF Corp (NYSE:VFC).
Is VF Corp (NYSE:VFC) a buy here? Prominent investors are in a bearish mood. The number of long hedge fund bets shrunk by 1 lately. The level and the change in hedge fund popularity aren’t the only variables you need to analyze to decipher hedge funds’ perspectives. A stock may witness a boost in popularity but it may still be less popular than similarly priced stocks. That’s why at the end of this article we will examine companies such as PPL Corporation (NYSE:PPL), Deere & Company (NYSE:DE), and Cardinal Health, Inc. (NYSE:CAH) to gather more data points.
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What have hedge funds been doing with VF Corp (NYSE:VFC)?
Heading into the fourth quarter of 2016, a total of 22 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a decline of 4% from the second quarter of 2016. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes meaningfully (or already accumulated large positions).
Of the funds tracked by Insider Monkey, Ric Dillon’s Diamond Hill Capital has the biggest position in VF Corp (NYSE:VFC), worth close to $166.5 million, accounting for 1% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Citadel Investment Group, led by Ken Griffin, holding a $83.4 million position. Some other professional money managers that are bullish consist of Anand Parekh’s Alyeska Investment Group, Ray Dalio’s Bridgewater Associates and Jim Simons’ Renaissance Technologies.
Since VF Corp (NYSE:VFC) has witnessed a decline in interest from the smart money, we can see that there was a specific group of hedgies that slashed their entire stakes heading into fourth quarter. It’s worth mentioning that Joel Greenblatt’s Gotham Asset Management dropped the largest position of all the hedgies watched by Insider Monkey, worth an estimated $34.5 million in call options, and Alexander Mitchell’s Scopus Asset Management was right behind this move, as the fund cut about $18.4 million worth of shares. These bearish behaviors are important to note, as aggregate hedge fund interest fell by 1 fund heading into fourth quarter.
Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to VF Corp (NYSE:VFC). We will take a look at PPL Corporation (NYSE:PPL), Deere & Company (NYSE:DE), Cardinal Health, Inc. (NYSE:CAH), and Edison International (NYSE:EIX). This group of stocks’ market valuations are closest to VFC’s market valuation.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| PPL | 22 | 536205 | -4 |
| DE | 27 | 3324122 | -6 |
| CAH | 26 | 666390 | -8 |
| EIX | 19 | 640459 | -1 |
As you can see these stocks had an average of 23.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $1.29 billion. That figure was $375 million in VFC’s case. Deere & Company (NYSE:DE) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Edison International (NYSE:EIX) is the least popular one with only 19 bullish hedge fund positions. VF Corp (NYSE:VFC) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard DE might be a better candidate to consider a long position in.
Disclosure: None
