More and More Hedge Funds are Selling SouFun Holdings Limited (ADR) (SFUN)

Since SouFun Holdings Limited (ADR) (NYSE:SFUN) has faced falling interest from the smart money, it’s safe to say that there were a few hedgies who sold off their full holdings heading into Q4. It’s worth mentioning that Rob Citrone’s Discovery Capital Management dumped the largest stake of the “upper crust” of funds tracked by Insider Monkey, worth close to $70 million in stock, and John Burbank’s Passport Capital was right behind this move, as the fund said goodbye to about $19.3 million worth of shares. These bearish behaviors are interesting, as total hedge fund interest fell by 13 funds heading into Q4.

Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as SouFun Holdings Limited (ADR) (NYSE:SFUN) but similarly valued. These stocks are Home Bancshares Inc (NASDAQ:HOMB), Southwest Gas Corporation (NYSE:SWX), Tenneco Inc (NYSE:TEN), and Con-way Inc (NYSE:CNW). This group of stocks’ market values are closest to SFUN’s market value.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 19.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $252 million. That figure was $312 million in SFUN’s case. Tenneco Inc (NYSE:TEN) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Southwest Gas Corporation (NYSE:SWX) is the least popular one with only 12 bullish hedge fund positions. SouFun Holdings Limited (ADR) (NYSE:SFUN) 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 confident in, not selling out of. In this regard TEN might be a better candidate to consider a long position in.