Hedge Funds Are Dumping Chemed Corporation (CHE)

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Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE) was in 8 hedge funds’ portfolio at the end of the fourth quarter of 2012. CHE investors should be aware of a decrease in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds in recent months. There were 9 hedge funds in our database with CHE positions at the end of the previous quarter.

Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE)

In the financial world, there are a multitude of metrics shareholders can use to analyze their holdings. A couple of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading interest. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the top fund managers can outperform their index-focused peers by a healthy amount (see just how much).

Equally as integral, bullish insider trading sentiment is a second way to break down the financial markets. Just as you’d expect, there are lots of incentives for an insider to downsize shares of his or her company, but only one, very simple reason why they would behave bullishly. Various empirical studies have demonstrated the market-beating potential of this method if piggybackers understand what to do (learn more here).

Keeping this in mind, let’s take a peek at the recent action encompassing Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE).

How are hedge funds trading Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE)?

At the end of the fourth quarter, a total of 8 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of -11% from the third quarter. With hedgies’ sentiment swirling, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were increasing their stakes considerably.

Of the funds we track, Chuck Royce’s Royce & Associates had the most valuable position in Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE), worth close to $125 million, accounting for 0.4% of its total 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is GAMCO Investors, managed by Mario Gabelli, which held a $53.3 million position; 0.4% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Other peers that are bullish include Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management, Joel Greenblatt’s Gotham Asset Management and Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group.

Since Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE) has faced falling interest from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, we can see that there is a sect of hedge funds that slashed their full holdings at the end of the year. It’s worth mentioning that Mike Vranos’s Ellington cut the largest investment of all the hedgies we watch, valued at close to $0.7 million in stock.. Neil Chriss’s fund, Hutchin Hill Capital, also said goodbye to its stock, about $0.3 million worth. These bearish behaviors are intriguing to say the least, as total hedge fund interest fell by 1 funds at the end of the year.

What do corporate executives and insiders think about Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE)?

Insider buying is particularly usable when the company in focus has experienced transactions within the past half-year. Over the last half-year time period, Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE) has experienced zero unique insiders buying, and 5 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also take a look at hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Chemed Corporation (NYSE:CHE). These stocks are Addus Homecare Corporation (NASDAQ:ADUS), Almost Family, Inc. (NASDAQ:AFAM), Gentiva Health Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:GTIV), Amedisys Inc (NASDAQ:AMED), and LHC Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:LHCG). All of these stocks are in the home health care industry and their market caps are similar to CHE’s market cap.

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