Earnings Results Have These 5 Stocks On The Move Today

All three index futures along with crude are slightly lower today as traders digest the latest corporate earnings reports. In this article we’ll take a closer look at the earnings results of five notable companies during their latest quarter, those being Equity Lifestyle Properties, Inc. (NYSE:ELS), Steel Dynamics, Inc. (NASDAQ:STLD), IDEX Corporation (NYSE:IEX), Brown & Brown, Inc. (NYSE:BRO), and Rambus Inc. (NASDAQ:RMBS). We’ll also peer into hedge fund filings to determine how the world’s greatest investors are positioned in the five equities.

At Insider Monkey, we track around 765 hedge funds and institutional investors. Through extensive backtests, we have determined that imitating some of the stocks that these investors are collectively bullish on, can help retail investors generate double digits of alpha per year. The key is to focus on the small-cap picks of these funds, which are usually less followed by the broader market and allow for larger price inefficiencies (see the details here).

Equity Lifestyle’s FFO Exceeds Estimate

Equity Lifestyle Properties, Inc. (NYSE:ELS) reported FFO of $0.75 per share for the second quarter, beating the estimate by $0.01 per share. Revenue was $210.1 million, up by 4.3% year-over-year. Core property operating revenue excluding deferrals inched up by 4.2%, while core income from property operations excluding deferrals and property management rose by 6.1% year-over-year. On June 1, the company also completed the acquisition of a 1,168-site property located in Florida for $75.2 million and the assumption of mortgage debt of $22.6 million. Jim Simons‘ Renaissance Technologies owned 1.03 million shares of Equity Lifestyle Properties, Inc. (NYSE:ELS) at the end of March, up by 19% from the size of the fund’s holding at the end of December.

Steel Dynamics Reports Mixed Results 

Steel Dynamics, Inc. (NASDAQ:STLD) earned $0.58 per share on revenue of $2.02 billion for the second quarter, beating the bottom-line estimate by $0.02 per share but missing the top-line consensus mark by $20 million. Consolidated operating earnings rose by 94% sequentially to $256 million, led by continued momentum in the flat roll steel supply sector. Meanwhile, import levels of flat roll steel have dropped and inventory levels are more in-line with demand requirements. These two factors have led to healthier utilization rates and generally higher margins. Nonetheless, shares are down by 3.5% in pre-market trading today. ClearBridge‘s Legg Mason Capital Management reported owning a stake of 4.83 million Steel Dynamics shares as of March 31.

On the next page we’ll take a closer look at the results reported by IDEX Corporation, Brown & Brown Inc, and Rambus Inc.