The E.W. Scripps Company (SSP) Is A New Position in This Hedge Fund’s Equity Portfolio

In the equity portfolio of Rob Butts and Josh Clark’s Southpoint Capital Advisors, The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP) has become a new position. In a recent 13G filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Southpoint Capital Advisors reported a stake in The E.W. Scripps Company, which contains 2.4 million shares and is worth $37.3 million, at the current price of the stock. In this way, the hedge fund currently owns 5.28% of The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP), joining other notable investors who are also bullish on the company, and becoming one of the largest shareholders.

In the 21st century investor’s toolkit, there are many indicators market participants can use to track their holdings. A pair of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading sentiment. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the top fund managers can beat the broader indices by a very impressive amount (see just how much).

Equally as useful, bullish insider trading sentiment is another way to look at the world of equities. There are plenty of motivations for an upper level exec to drop shares of his or her company, but just one, very simple reason why they would buy. Several academic studies have demonstrated the market-beating potential of this strategy if investors know what to do (learn more here).

Now that that’s out of the way, it’s important to examine the recent info surrounding The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP).

Hedge fund activity in The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP)

Heading into Q3, a total of 14 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of -7% from one quarter earlier. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were increasing their holdings substantially.

According to our 13F database, Blue Mountain Capital, managed by Andrew Feldstein and Stephen Siderow, holds the most valuable position in The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP). Blue Mountain Capital has a $59.9 million position in the stock, comprising 2.5% of its 13F portfolio. Other hedgies that are bullish include Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group, Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies and Peter Algert and Kevin Coldiron’s Algert Coldiron Investors.

Due to the fact The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP) has experienced a fall in interest from the top-tier hedge fund industry, we can see that there were a few hedge funds who sold off their entire stakes last quarter. Interestingly, Jeffrey Gates’s Gates Capital Management sold off the biggest position of the 450+ funds we key on, comprising about $37.6 million in stock. Dennis Leibowitz’s fund, Act II Capital, also sold off its stock, about $3.7 million worth. These bearish behaviors are intriguing to say the least, as aggregate hedge fund interest was cut by 1 funds last quarter.

How are insiders trading The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP)?

Insider buying made by high-level executives is at its handiest when the company in focus has experienced transactions within the past 180 days. Over the latest six-month time frame, The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP) has experienced zero unique insiders buying, 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 The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP). These stocks are Daily Journal Corporation (NASDAQ:DJCO), Media General, Inc. (NYSE:MEG), The McClatchy Company (NYSE:MNI), The New York Times Company (NYSE:NYT), and Journal Communications, Inc. (NYSE:JRN). This group of stocks belong to the publishing – newspapers industry and their market caps are closest to SSP’s market cap.

Using the returns explained by Insider Monkey’s studies, regular investors should always keep one eye on hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and The E.W. Scripps Company (NYSE:SSP) applies perfectly to this mantra.

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