Here is What Hedge Funds Think About Northrim BanCorp, Inc. (NRIM)

We view hedge fund activity in the stock unfavorable, but in this case there was only a single hedge fund selling its entire position: Harvest Capital Strategies. One hedge fund selling its entire position doesn’t always imply a bearish intent. Theoretically a hedge fund may decide to sell a promising position in order to invest the proceeds in a more promising idea. However, we don’t think this is the case in this case because none of the 700+ hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey identified NRIM as a viable investment and initiated a position in the stock.

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Northrim BanCorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NRIM) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Denison Mines Corp (USA) (NYSEMKT:DNN), Control4 Corp (NASDAQ:CTRL), Mattersight Corporation (NASDAQ:MATR), and Alliance One International, Inc. (NYSE:AOI). This group of stocks’ market values match NRIM’s market value.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 6 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $20 million, compared to $22 million in NRIM’s case. Alliance One International, Inc. (NYSE:AOI) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Denison Mines Corp (USA) (NYSEMKT:DNN) is the least popular one with only 4 bullish hedge fund positions. Northrim BanCorp, Inc. (NASDAQ:NRIM) is not the most popular stock in this group, but hedge fund interest is still above average. This is a slightly positive signal, but we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard AOI might be a better candidate to consider a long position.