Do Hedge Funds Love Highwoods Properties Inc (HIW)?

Now, some big names were leading the bulls’ herd. Echo Street Capital Management, managed by Greg Poole, assembled the most valuable position in Highwoods Properties Inc (NYSE:HIW). Echo Street Capital Management had $0.7 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Mike Vranos’s Ellington also initiated an $0.5 million position during the quarter. The only other fund with a brand new HIW position is Chao Ku’s Nine Chapters Capital Management.

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Highwoods Properties Inc (NYSE:HIW). We will take a look at Urban Outfitters, Inc. (NASDAQ:URBN), Sun Communities Inc (NYSE:SUI), Solera Holdings Inc (NYSE:SLH), and PTC Inc (NASDAQ:PTC). This group of stocks’ market caps are closest to HIW’s market cap.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $472 million, significantly higher than the $89 million figure in HIW’s case. Solera Holdings Inc (NYSE:SLH) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Sun Communities Inc (NYSE:SUI) is the least popular one with only 6 bullish hedge fund positions. Highwoods Properties Inc (NYSE:HIW) 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 SLH might be a better candidate to consider a long position.