Hedge Funds Are Selling MFA Financial, Inc. (MFA)

Seeing as MFA Financial, Inc. (NYSE:MFA) has witnessed a falling interest from hedge fund managers, logic holds that there were a few hedgies that slashed their positions entirely by the end of the third quarter. Intriguingly, Wayne Cooperman’s Cobalt Capital Management cut the biggest stake of all the investors studied by Insider Monkey, comprising about $9.1 million in stock. Matthew Hulsizer’s fund, PEAK6 Capital Management, also dropped its call options, about $0.2 million worth.

Let’s now take a look at hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as MFA Financial, Inc. (NYSE:MFA) but similarly valued. These stocks are Brinker International, Inc. (NYSE:EAT), Sunstone Hotel Investors Inc (NYSE:SHO), Kite Pharma Inc (NASDAQ:KITE), and Manchester United PLC (NYSE:MANU). This group of stocks’ market values match MFA’s market value.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 16 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $147 million. That figure was $54 million in MFA’s case. Kite Pharma Inc (NASDAQ:KITE) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Sunstone Hotel Investors Inc (NYSE:SHO) is the least popular one with only 7 bullish hedge fund positions. MFA Financial, Inc. (NYSE:MFA) 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 KITE might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.

Disclosure: None