What Do Hedge Funds Think of Sempra Energy (SRE)?

Since Sempra Energy (NYSE:SRE) has witnessed a declination in interest from the smart money, logic holds that there was a specific group of funds that slashed their entire stakes last quarter. Interestingly, Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management dumped the largest stake of the “upper crust” of funds tracked by Insider Monkey, totaling an estimated $22.8 million in stock. Robert Vollero and Gentry T. Beach’s fund, Vollero Beach Capital Partners, also cut its stock, about $20 million worth. These moves are interesting, as total hedge fund interest fell by 5 funds last quarter.

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Sempra Energy (NYSE:SRE). We will take a look at PPG Industries, Inc. (NYSE:PPG), McGraw Hill Financial Inc (NYSE:MHFI), Kellogg Company (NYSE:K), and Chunghwa Telecom Co., Ltd (ADR) (NYSE:CHT). This group of stocks’ market values resemble SRE’s market value.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 36.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $1267 million. That figure was $969 million in SRE’s case. McGraw Hill Financial Inc (NYSE:MHFI) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Chunghwa Telecom Co., Ltd (ADR) (NYSE:CHT) is the least popular one with only 9 bullish hedge fund positions. Sempra Energy (NYSE:SRE) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard MHFI might be a better candidate to consider a long position.