Should You Buy The Pantry, Inc. (PTRY)?

Is The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY) a worthy investment now? The smart money is getting more bullish. The number of long hedge fund bets moved up by 2 lately.

In the 21st century investor’s toolkit, there are tons of metrics market participants can use to monitor publicly traded companies. A duo of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading interest. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the elite money managers can outpace the broader indices by a superb margin (see just how much).

Equally as beneficial, positive insider trading sentiment is another way to break down the marketplace. There are a number of motivations for a bullish insider to cut shares of his or her company, but only one, very clear reason why they would initiate a purchase. Various empirical studies have demonstrated the market-beating potential of this tactic if investors know where to look (learn more here).

Now, let’s take a peek at the latest action regarding The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY).

What does the smart money think about The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY)?

At the end of the first quarter, a total of 13 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 18% from the first quarter. With hedge funds’ capital changing hands, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were upping their stakes considerably.

When looking at the hedgies we track, Andy Redleaf’s Whitebox Advisors had the biggest position in The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY), worth close to $5.9 million, comprising 0.3% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, which held a $5 million position; less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Other hedgies that are bullish include Chuck Royce’s Royce & Associates, Israel Englander’s Millennium Management and Joel Greenblatt’s Gotham Asset Management.

As one would reasonably expect, key hedge funds have jumped into The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY) headfirst. Millennium Management, managed by Israel Englander, initiated the biggest position in The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY). Millennium Management had 2.3 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Mike Vranos’s Ellington also made a $0.3 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The only other fund with a new position in the stock is Matthew Tewksbury’s Stevens Capital Management.

How have insiders been trading The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY)?

Insider purchases made by high-level executives is most useful when the company we’re looking at has experienced transactions within the past 180 days. Over the latest half-year time frame, The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY) has experienced zero unique insiders buying, and 4 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also review hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to The Pantry, Inc. (NASDAQ:PTRY). These stocks are Core-Mark Holding Company, Inc. (NASDAQ:CORE), Ingles Markets, Incorporated (NASDAQ:IMKTA), Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage Inc (NYSE:NGVC), Arden Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:ARDNA), and Roundy’s Inc (NYSE:RNDY). This group of stocks are in the grocery stores industry and their market caps resemble PTRY’s market cap.