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. Insider Monkey finished processing more than 750 13F filings submitted by hedge funds and prominent investors. These filings show these funds’ portfolio positions as of September 30th, 2019. In this article we are going to take a look at smart money sentiment towards Griffin Industrial Realty, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIF).
Hedge fund interest in Griffin Industrial Realty, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIF) shares was flat at the end of last quarter. This is usually a negative indicator. 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 Standard Diversified Inc. (NYSE:SDI), DNB Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:DNBF), and Lifevantage Corporation (NASDAQ:LFVN) to gather more data points. Our calculations also showed that GRIF isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (see the video below).
Video: Click the image to watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.
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. Our research has shown that hedge funds’ large-cap stock picks indeed failed to beat the market between 1999 and 2016. However, we were able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that outperformed the Russell 2000 ETFs by 40 percentage points since May 2014 (see the details here). We were also able to identify in advance a select group of hedge fund holdings that’ll significantly underperform the market. We have been tracking and sharing the list of these stocks since February 2017 and they lost 27.8% through November 21, 2019. That’s why we believe hedge fund sentiment is an extremely useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.
We’re going to take a look at the key hedge fund action encompassing Griffin Industrial Realty, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIF).
How are hedge funds trading Griffin Industrial Realty, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIF)?
At Q3’s end, a total of 2 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 0% from the previous quarter. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards GRIF over the last 17 quarters. So, let’s check out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.
Among these funds, GAMCO Investors held the most valuable stake in Griffin Industrial Realty, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIF), which was worth $25.4 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was Renaissance Technologies which amassed $1.9 million worth of shares.
Earlier we told you that the aggregate hedge fund interest in the stock was unchanged and we view this as a negative development. Even though there weren’t any hedge funds dumping their holdings during the third quarter, there weren’t any hedge funds initiating brand new positions. This indicates that hedge funds, at the very best, perceive this stock as dead money and they haven’t identified any viable catalysts that can attract investor attention.
Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Griffin Industrial Realty, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIF) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Standard Diversified Inc. (NYSE:SDI), DNB Financial Corp. (NASDAQ:DNBF), Lifevantage Corporation (NASDAQ:LFVN), and Bank7 Corp. (NASDAQ:BSVN). This group of stocks’ market valuations resemble GRIF’s market valuation.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| SDI | 4 | 4190 | 0 |
| DNBF | 5 | 11226 | 1 |
| LFVN | 8 | 18845 | 1 |
| BSVN | 3 | 11658 | 0 |
| Average | 5 | 11480 | 0.5 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $11 million. That figure was $27 million in GRIF’s case. Lifevantage Corporation (NASDAQ:LFVN) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Bank7 Corp. (NASDAQ:BSVN) is the least popular one with only 3 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks Griffin Industrial Realty, Inc. (NASDAQ:GRIF) is even less popular than BSVN. Hedge funds dodged a bullet by taking a bearish stance towards GRIF. Our calculations showed that the top 20 most popular hedge fund stocks returned 34.7% in 2019 through November 22nd and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 8.5 percentage points. Unfortunately GRIF wasn’t nearly as popular as these 20 stocks (hedge fund sentiment was very bearish); GRIF investors were disappointed as the stock returned 1.6% during the fourth quarter (through 11/22) and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds as 70 percent of these stocks already outperformed the market so far in Q4.
Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
