Should You Buy Pan American Silver Corp. (USA) (PAAS)?

As industrywide interest jumped, some big names were leading the bulls’ herd. Prince Street Capital Management, led by David Halpert, created the most valuable position in Pan American Silver Corp. (USA) (NASDAQ:PAAS). Prince Street Capital Management had $10.2 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. George Hall’s Clinton Group also initiated a $4.7 million position during the quarter. The other funds with brand new PAAS positions are Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group, Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management, and Ari Zweiman’s 683 Capital Partners.

Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Pan American Silver Corp. (USA) (NASDAQ:PAAS) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Corporate Office Properties Trust (NYSE:OFC), Stantec Inc. (USA) (NYSE:STN), Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX), and CNO Financial Group Inc (NYSE:CNO). This group of stocks’ market valuations are similar to PAAS’s market valuation.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 16.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $200 million. That figure was $196 million in PAAS’s case. Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Stantec Inc. (USA) (NYSE:STN) is the least popular one with only 6 bullish hedge fund positions. Pan American Silver Corp. (USA) (NASDAQ:PAAS) 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 LPX might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.