Do Hedge Funds Love Hecla Mining Company (HL)?

As aggregate interest increased, some big names were breaking ground themselves. BlueCrest Capital Mgmt., managed by Michael Platt and William Reeves, initiated the largest position in Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL). According to regulatory filings, the fund had $1.5 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Paul Marshall and Ian Wace’s Marshall Wace LLP also made a $1.2 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new HL investors: Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group, Paul Orlin and Alex Porter’s Amici Capital, and Andrew Feldstein and Stephen Siderow’s Blue Mountain Capital.

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) but similarly valued. These stocks are NovaGold Resources Inc. (USA) (NYSEAMEX:NG), Sanderson Farms, Inc. (NASDAQ:SAFM), Dave & Buster’s Entertainment, Inc. (NASDAQ:PLAY), and Qunar Cayman Islands Ltd (NASDAQ:QUNR). All of these stocks’ market caps match HL’s market cap.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 20 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $235 million. That figure was $92 million in HL’s case. Dave & Buster’s Entertainment, Inc. (NASDAQ:PLAY) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Qunar Cayman Islands Ltd (NASDAQ:QUNR) is the least popular one with only 7 bullish hedge fund positions. Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard PLAY might be a better candidate to consider a long position.

Disclosure: none.