Hedge Funds Are Buying Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR) – Parkway Properties Inc (NYSE:PKY), American Assets Trust, Inc (NYSE:AAT)

Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR) investors should pay attention to an increase in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds in recent months.

To the average investor, there are tons of metrics market participants can use to analyze publicly traded companies. A couple of the most innovative are hedge fund and insider trading interest. At Insider Monkey, our research analyses have shown that, historically, those who follow the best picks of the best fund managers can trounce the market by a healthy amount (see just how much).

Parkway Properties Inc (NYSE:PKY)

Just as beneficial, bullish insider trading activity is a second way to parse down the investments you’re interested in. Just as you’d expect, there are plenty of incentives for an upper level exec to drop shares of his or her company, but just one, very simple reason why they would behave bullishly. Many academic studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this method if piggybackers understand where to look (learn more here).

With these “truths” under our belt, let’s take a glance at the recent action regarding Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR).

How are hedge funds trading Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR)?

In preparation for this year, a total of 11 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of 38% from one quarter earlier. With the smart money’s capital changing hands, there exists a few notable hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings meaningfully.

When looking at the hedgies we track, Anthony Bozza’s Lakewood Capital Management had the biggest position in Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR), worth close to $31 million, accounting for 2.5% of its total 13F portfolio. Coming in second is AEW Capital Management, managed by Jeffrey Furber, which held a $12 million position; the fund has 0.3% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Other hedge funds that are bullish include D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw, Howard Guberman’s Gruss Asset Management and Israel Englander’s Millennium Management.

As industrywide interest jumped, specific money managers were breaking ground themselves. Driehaus Capital, managed by Richard Driehaus, initiated the most valuable position in Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR). Driehaus Capital had 4 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Jim Simons’s Renaissance Technologies also initiated a $3 million position during the quarter. The other funds with new positions in the stock are Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management and Mike Vranos’s Ellington.

How have insiders been trading Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR)?

Insider purchases made by high-level executives is most useful when the company in question has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the latest half-year time frame, Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR) has experienced zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

Let’s also review hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR). These stocks are Government Properties Income Trust (NYSE:GOV), Parkway Properties Inc (NYSE:PKY), American Assets Trust, Inc (NYSE:AAT), Hudson Pacific Properties Inc (NYSE:HPP), and Franklin Street Properties Corp. (NYSEAMEX:FSP). This group of stocks are the members of the reit – office industry and their market caps match SIR’s market cap.

Company Name # of Hedge Funds # of Insiders Buying # of Insiders Selling
Government Properties Income Trust (NYSE:GOV) 4 0 1
Parkway Properties Inc (NYSE:PKY) 8 3 0
American Assets Trust, Inc (NYSE:AAT) 7 1 0
Hudson Pacific Properties Inc (NYSE:HPP) 5 0 1
Franklin Street Properties Corp. (NYSEAMEX:FSP) 2 1 0

With the results shown by Insider Monkey’s tactics, everyday investors must always keep an eye on hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Select Income REIT (NYSE:SIR) is an important part of this process.