To many of your peers, hedge funds are viewed as delayed, old investment vehicles of an era lost to time. Although there are over 8,000 hedge funds trading currently, Insider Monkey aim at the aristocrats of this group, around 525 funds. Analysts calculate that this group controls most of the smart money’s total assets, and by keeping an eye on their best picks, we’ve found a number of investment strategies that have historically outpaced the market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy outperformed the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points annually for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve began to sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have topped the S&P 500 index by 33 percentage points in 11 months (see all of our picks from August).
Equally as useful, optimistic insider trading activity is another way to analyze the world of equities. As the old adage goes: there are lots of incentives for an upper level exec to get rid of shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would buy. Plenty of empirical studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this method if shareholders understand where to look (learn more here).
What’s more, it’s important to examine the recent info about Swift Energy Company (NYSE:SFY).
What have hedge funds been doing with Swift Energy Company (NYSE:SFY)?
Heading into Q3, a total of 15 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of 0% from the previous quarter. With the smart money’s positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a few noteworthy hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly.
Out of the hedge funds we follow, Private Capital Management, managed by Gregg J. Powers, holds the biggest position in Swift Energy Company (NYSE:SFY). Private Capital Management has a $25.6 million position in the stock, comprising 2.4% of its 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Israel Englander of Millennium Management, with a $8.6 million position; the fund has less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Other hedgies that are bullish include Chuck Royce’s Royce & Associates, Mark Travis’s Intrepid Capital Management and D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw.
What have insiders been doing with Swift Energy Company (NYSE:SFY)?
Bullish insider trading is particularly usable when the primary stock in question has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the last 180-day time frame, Swift Energy Company (NYSE:SFY) has seen zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
We’ll also take a look at the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Swift Energy Company (NYSE:SFY). These stocks are Sanchez Energy Corp (NYSE:SN), Contango Oil & Gas Company (NYSEAMEX:MCF), Chesapeake Granite Wash Trust (NYSE:CHKR), Forest Oil Corporation (NYSE:FST), and TransGlobe Energy Corporation (USA) (NASDAQ:TGA). This group of stocks are in the independent oil & gas industry and their market caps are similar to SFY’s market cap.
| Company Name | # of Hedge Funds | # of Insiders Buying | # of Insiders Selling |
| Sanchez Energy Corp (NYSE:SN) | 10 | 0 | 0 |
| Contango Oil & Gas Company (NYSEAMEX:MCF) | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| Chesapeake Granite Wash Trust (NYSE:CHKR) | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| Forest Oil Corporation (NYSE:FST) | 24 | 0 | 0 |
| TransGlobe Energy Corporation (USA) (NASDAQ:TGA) | 7 | 0 | 0 |
Using the results demonstrated by our analyses, regular investors must always watch hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Swift Energy Company (NYSE:SFY) is no exception.
