Why Are These Stocks Falling?

At a time when the S&P 500 is off by around half a percent, shares of GoPro Inc (NASDAQ:GPRO), RetailMeNot Inc (NASDAQ:SALE), Party City Holdco Inc (NYSE:PRTY), and Sophiris Bio Inc (NASDAQ:SPHS) are off by substantially more. Let’s find out why.

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In addition, let’s also examine relevant hedge fund sentiment toward the four stocks. In the eyes of most traders, hedge funds are assumed to be underperforming, old investment tools of the past. While there are more than 8000 funds in operation at present, Hedge fund experts at Insider Monkey look at the aristocrats of this group, around 730 funds. Contrary to popular belief Insider Monkey’s research revealed that hedge funds underperformed in recent years because of their short positions as well as the huge fees that they charge. Hedge funds managed to outperform the market on the long side of their portfolio. In fact, the 15 most popular small-cap stocks among hedge funds have returned 102% since the end of August 2012 and beat the S&P 500 Index by 53 percentage points (see the details here).

First up, GoPro Inc (NASDAQ:GPRO) is off by 7% in afternoon trading as sentiment around the stock continues to deteriorate. Investors no longer believe the company can sustain the type of earnings growth that the company has experienced before. They also worry about commoditization and competition from other firms such as Xiaomi. Because of the negative sentiment, shares of the wearable camera maker are down over 60% year-to-date as long investors head for the exits and short sellers pile on.

Hedge funds are divided on GoPro Inc (NASDAQ:GPRO), although the overall sentiment is bullish. Of the 730+ elite funds we track, 21 funds owned $485.28 million worth of the company’s shares (representing 10.20% of the float) on June 30, versus 25 funds with stakes worth $284.33 million on March 31. Among the funds with long positions at the end of the second quarter were Edward Gilhuly’s Sageview Capital with around 2.30 million shares and
Clifford Fox’s Columbus Circle Investors with 1.0 million shares. On the other hand, Jim Simons’ Renaissance Technologies cut its stake by 59% during the third quarter to 381,500 shares. A total of 21% of the action camera maker’s float is on ‘borrow’ by short sellers.

In other news, RetailMeNot Inc (NASDAQ:SALE) is down almost 10% after private equity firm Austin Ventures distributed its common stock holdings of the RetailMeNot to its partners on Thursday. According to SEC filings, Austin Ventures and its affiliates owned around 7.6 million shares, or over 14% of the company. Shares are off because some investors think Austin Ventures’ move could lead to more selling. RetailMeNot is off by over 30% year-to-date. Of the 730 elite funds we track, 21 funds owned $197.77 million worth of RetailMeNot Inc (NASDAQ:SALE)’s shares, accounting for 20.80% of the float, on June 30. Matt Sirovich and Jeremy Mindich‘s Scopia Capital owned 6.7 million RetailMeNot shares at the end of the second quarter.

On the next page, we examine why Party City and Sophiris Bio are down.