Where Do Hedge Funds Stand On Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (IEA)?

The latest 13F reporting period has come and gone, and Insider Monkey is again at the forefront when it comes to making use of this gold mine of data. We have processed the filings of the more than 817 world-class investment firms that we track and now have access to the collective wisdom contained in these filings, which are based on their September 30 holdings, data that is available nowhere else. Should you consider Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA) for your portfolio? We’ll look to this invaluable collective wisdom for the answer.

Hedge fund interest in Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA) shares was flat at the end of last quarter. This is usually a negative indicator. Our calculations also showed that IEA isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings and see the video for a quick look at the top 5 stocks). At the end of this article we will also compare IEA to other stocks including Lantronix Inc (NASDAQ:LTRX), Ocean Bio-Chem, Inc. (NASDAQ:OBCI), and XpresSpa Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:XSPA) to get a better sense of its popularity.

Video: Watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.

Today there are plenty of tools investors can use to evaluate stocks. A duo of the best tools are hedge fund and insider trading interest. We have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the best fund managers can outclass the S&P 500 by a significant margin (see the details here).

Philip Hempleman of Ardsley Partners

At Insider Monkey we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, Federal Reserve has been creating trillions of dollars electronically to keep the interest rates near zero. We believe this will lead to inflation and boost real estate prices. So, we recommended this real estate stock to our monthly premium newsletter subscribers. We go through lists like the 15 best blue chip stocks to pick the best large-cap stocks to buy. Even though we recommend positions in only a tiny fraction of the companies we analyze, we check out as many stocks as we can. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. You can subscribe to our free daily newsletter on our website. With all of this in mind we’re going to analyze the latest hedge fund action surrounding Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA).

How have hedgies been trading Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA)?

Heading into the fourth quarter of 2020, a total of 7 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of 0% from the previous quarter. By comparison, 7 hedge funds held shares or bullish call options in IEA a year ago. So, let’s find out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

According to publicly available hedge fund and institutional investor holdings data compiled by Insider Monkey, Ardsley Partners, managed by Philip Hempleman, holds the most valuable position in Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA). Ardsley Partners has a $6.4 million position in the stock, comprising 1.2% of its 13F portfolio. Coming in second is Royce & Associates, led by Chuck Royce, holding a $5.2 million position; 0.1% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Some other professional money managers that hold long positions comprise Renaissance Technologies, Scott Stewart Miller’s Greenhaven Road Investment Management and Howard Marks’s Oaktree Capital Management. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Ardsley Partners allocated the biggest weight to Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA), around 1.23% of its 13F portfolio. Greenhaven Road Investment Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, setting aside 0.21 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to IEA.

We view hedge fund activity in the stock unfavorable, but in this case there was only a single hedge fund selling its entire position: 999. One hedge fund selling its entire position doesn’t always imply a bearish intent. Theoretically a hedge fund may decide to sell a promising position in order to invest the proceeds in a more promising idea. However, we don’t think this is the case in this case because only one of the 800+ hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey identified as a viable investment and initiated a position in the stock (that fund was Ardsley Partners).

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA). These stocks are Lantronix Inc (NASDAQ:LTRX), Ocean Bio-Chem, Inc. (NASDAQ:OBCI), XpresSpa Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:XSPA), PFSweb, Inc. (NASDAQ:PFSW), EDAP TMS S.A. (NASDAQ:EDAP), PCB Bancorp (NASDAQ:PCB), and ESSA Bancorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:ESSA). This group of stocks’ market values match IEA’s market value.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 3.9 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $9 million. That figure was $17 million in IEA’s case. PFSweb, Inc. (NASDAQ:PFSW) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Ocean Bio-Chem, Inc. (NASDAQ:OBCI) is the least popular one with only 2 bullish hedge fund positions. Infrastructure and Energy Alternatives, Inc. (NASDAQ:IEA) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for IEA is 72.9. Stocks with higher number of hedge fund positions relative to other stocks as well as relative to their historical range receive a higher sentiment score. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 41.3% in 2019 and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 10 percentage points. These stocks gained 31.6% in 2020 through December 2nd and still beat the market by 16 percentage points. Hedge funds were also right about betting on IEA as the stock returned 92.8% since the end of Q3 (through 12/2) and outperformed the market. Hedge funds were rewarded for their relative bullishness.

Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.