Strategic Hotels and Resorts Inc (BEE): Bill Gates’ Cascade Buys More Shares

The last acquisition of shares of Strategic Hotels and Resorts Inc (NYSE:BEE) comes only a couple of days after the company announced its financial results for the last quarter and full-year 2014. Strategic Hotels & Resorts, a self-administered and self-managed real estate investment trust (REIT), posted significant revenue growth to $313 million for the fourth quarter of 2014, versus $217 million a year earlier. However, the company’s earnings fell to $0.01 per share, from $0.02. Additionally for the full year, Strategic Hotels and Resorts’ revenue appreciated to $1.09 billion from $900 million a year earlier and diluted EPS jumped to $1.30 from a loss of $0.06 posted for 2013. Despite top and bottom line growth, analysts have not been impressed by the performance of the REIT. Therefore, last week, JMP Securities lowered its price target to $15.00 from $16.00 with a ‘Market Outperform’ rating, and TheStreet downgraded the stock to ‘Hold’ from ‘Buy’.

Among over 700 funds that we track at Insider Monkey, the fourth quarter showed an increase in popularity for Strategic Hotels and Resorts Inc (NYSE:BEE), as the number of funds reporting ownership of the REIT’s shares in the last round of 13F filings increased to 20 from 14 a quarter earlier. Moreover, the company has seen an inflow of capital, to $146.01 million held in aggregate by the funds that we track, versus $120.64 million in the previous quarter. Surprisingly or not, Mr. Gates’ other entity managed by Mr. Larson, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust is not among the REIT’s shareholders. However, during the fourth quarter, Strategic Hotels and Resorts Inc (NYSE:BEE) attracted the attention of several billionaires, such as Israel Englander of Millennium Management and Jim Simons of Renaissance Technologies, both of whom initiated stakes. At the end of 2014, Millennium and Renaissance held 1.23 million shares and 914,900 shares respectively.

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