Hedge Funds Are Buying Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST)

Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST) investors should pay attention to an increase in hedge fund sentiment lately.

To the average investor, there are plenty of methods investors can use to track their holdings. A couple of the most useful are hedge fund and insider trading movement. At Insider Monkey, our studies have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the top hedge fund managers can outperform the market by a very impressive margin (see just how much).

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Just as key, optimistic insider trading sentiment is another way to parse down the marketplace. Just as you’d expect, there are plenty of stimuli for an executive to get rid of shares of his or her company, but only one, very obvious reason why they would buy. Several empirical studies have demonstrated the market-beating potential of this method if shareholders understand where to look (learn more here).

Keeping this in mind, it’s important to take a gander at the recent action surrounding Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST).

How are hedge funds trading Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST)?

Heading into 2013, a total of 34 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of 36% from one quarter earlier. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes significantly.

When looking at the hedgies we track, Scout Capital Management, managed by James Crichton and Adam Weiss, holds the largest position in Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST). Scout Capital Management has a $336 million billion position in the stock, comprising 5.8% of its 13F portfolio. On Scout Capital Management’s heels is Blue Ridge Capital, managed by John Griffin, which held a $256 million position; the fund has 3.6% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Other peers that are bullish include Bain Capital’s Brookside Capital, Alan Fournier’s Pennant Capital Management and Daniel S. Och’s OZ Management.

As one would reasonably expect, some big names were breaking ground themselves. Brookside Capital, managed by Bain Capital, created the biggest position in Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST). Brookside Capital had 206 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. William B. Gray’s Orbis Investment Management also made a $23 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with brand new ST positions are Glenn J. Krevlin’s Glenhill Advisors, Richard S. Meisenberg’s ACK Asset Management, and Alexander Mitchell’s Scopus Asset Management.

How have insiders been trading Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST)?

Insider purchases made by high-level executives is most useful when the primary stock in question has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the latest six-month time frame, Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST) has seen zero unique insiders purchasing, and 10 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

With the results demonstrated by our studies, retail investors must always monitor hedge fund and insider trading activity, and Sensata Technologies Holding N.V. (NYSE:ST) applies perfectly to this mantra.

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