This Metric Says You Are Smart to Buy Campus Crest Communities Inc (CCG)

Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG) investors should be aware of an increase in hedge fund interest recently.

If you’d ask most stock holders, hedge funds are seen as slow, old financial tools of years past. While there are greater than 8000 funds in operation at present, we choose to focus on the leaders of this club, about 450 funds. Most estimates calculate that this group has its hands on the lion’s share of the smart money’s total asset base, and by watching their highest performing stock picks, we have figured out a few investment strategies that have historically outpaced Mr. Market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per annum 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 outpaced the S&P 500 index by 23.3 percentage points in 8 months (see all of our picks from August).

Just as important, positive insider trading sentiment is another way to parse down the marketplace. As the old adage goes: there are a number of motivations for an insider to sell shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would buy. Many empirical studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this tactic if piggybackers know where to look (learn more here).

With all of this in mind, let’s take a look at the latest action surrounding Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG).

How are hedge funds trading Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG)?

Heading into Q2, a total of 14 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 75% from the previous quarter. With hedgies’ capital changing hands, there exists an “upper tier” of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes meaningfully.

Of the funds we track, Forward Management, managed by J. Alan Reid, Jr., holds the most valuable position in Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG). Forward Management has a $27.1 million position in the stock, comprising 1.7% of its 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, which held a $7 million position; less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Other peers with similar optimism include Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management, Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management and Richard Driehaus’s Driehaus Capital.

As industrywide interest jumped, some big names have jumped into Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG) headfirst. Balyasny Asset Management, managed by Dmitry Balyasny, assembled the largest position in Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG). Balyasny Asset Management had 3.1 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Richard Driehaus’s Driehaus Capital also made a $2.3 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with new positions in the stock are Mike Vranos’s Ellington, Paul Tudor Jones’s Tudor Investment Corp, and Paul Marshall and Ian Wace’s Marshall Wace LLP.

How are insiders trading Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG)?

Insider buying is particularly usable when the company in focus has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the last six-month time frame, Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG) has experienced 1 unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

With the results shown by the aforementioned research, everyday investors should always keep an eye on hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Campus Crest Communities Inc (NYSE:CCG) is an important part of this process.

Click here to learn why you should track hedge funds