Hedge Funds Are Selling USA Technologies, Inc. (USAT)

Judging by the fact that USA Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:USAT) has witnessed declining sentiment from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, it’s easy to see that there is a sect of hedgies that decided to sell off their full holdings in the third quarter. Intriguingly, Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies dumped the largest position of all the hedgies followed by Insider Monkey, totaling close to $0.1 million in call options, and Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group was right behind this move, as the fund said goodbye to its position too. These transactions are interesting, as aggregate hedge fund interest was cut by 1 funds in the third quarter.

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to USA Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:USAT). We will take a look at Imation Corp. (NYSE:IMN), Eastern Virginia Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:EVBS), Conatus Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ:CNAT), and Alliqua Biomedical Inc (NASDAQ:ALQA). All of these stocks’ market caps match USAT’s market cap.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 8.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $16 million. That figure was $3 million in USAT’s case. Conatus Pharmaceuticals Inc (NASDAQ:CNAT) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Eastern Virginia Bankshares, Inc. (NASDAQ:EVBS) is the least popular one with only 5 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks USA Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:USAT) is even less popular than EVBS. Considering that hedge funds aren’t fond of this stock in relation to other companies analyzed in this article, it may be a good idea to analyze it in detail and understand why the smart money isn’t behind this stock. This isn’t necessarily bad news. Although it is possible that hedge funds may think the stock is overpriced and view the stock as a short candidate, they may not be very familiar with the bullish thesis. In either case more research is warranted.