It seems that the masses and most of the financial media hate hedge funds and what they do, but why is this hatred of hedge funds so prominent? At the end of the day, these asset management firms do not gamble the hard-earned money of the people who are on the edge of poverty. Truth be told, most hedge fund managers and other smaller players within this industry are very smart and skilled investors. Of course, they may also make wrong bets in some instances, but no one knows what the future holds and how market participants will react to the bountiful news that floods in each day. The S&P 500 Index gained 7.6% in the 12 month-period that ended November 21, while less than 49% of its stocks beat the benchmark. In contrast, the 30 most popular mid-cap stocks among the top hedge fund investors tracked by the Insider Monkey team returned 18% over the same period, which provides evidence that these money managers do have great stock picking abilities. That’s why we believe it isn’t a waste of time to check out hedge fund sentiment before you invest in a stock like Ubiquiti Networks Inc (NASDAQ:UBNT) .
Ubiquiti Networks Inc (NASDAQ:UBNT) was in 15 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2016. UBNT has seen an increase in support from the world’s most successful money managers recently. There were 14 hedge funds in our database with UBNT holdings at the end of the previous quarter. At the end of this article we will also compare UBNT to other stocks including First Horizon National Corporation (NYSE:FHN), Huntsman Corporation (NYSE:HUN), and John Wiley & Sons Inc (NYSE:JW) to get a better sense of its popularity.
Follow Ubiquiti Inc. (NYSE:UI)
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We follow over 700 hedge funds and other institutional investors and by analyzing their quarterly 13F filings, we identify stocks that they are collectively bullish on and develop investment strategies based on this data. One strategy that outperformed the market over the last year, involves selecting the 100 best-performing funds and identifying the 30 mid-cap stocks that they are collectively most bullish on. Over the past year, this strategy generated returns of 18%, topping the 8% gain registered by S&P 500 ETFs.
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Now, we’re going to check out the fresh action encompassing Ubiquiti Networks Inc (NASDAQ:UBNT).
Hedge fund activity in Ubiquiti Networks Inc (NASDAQ:UBNT)
Heading into the fourth quarter of 2016, a total of 15 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, up 7% from one quarter earlier. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards UBNT over the last 5 quarters. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings substantially (or already accumulated large positions).
Of the funds tracked by Insider Monkey, Akre Capital Management, led by Charles Akre, holds the most valuable position in Ubiquiti Networks Inc (NASDAQ:UBNT). According to regulatory filings, the fund has a $143.4 million position in the stock, comprising 2.8% of its 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Jim Simons’ Renaissance Technologies, holding a $34.3 million position; 0.1% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Other professional money managers that are bullish contain Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital, George Soros’s Soros Fund Management and D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw. We should note that Soros Fund Management is among our list of the 100 best performing hedge funds which is based on the performance of their 13F long positions in non-microcap stocks.
