Is Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH) a good investment?
If you were to ask many of your peers, hedge funds are seen as overrated, outdated investment tools of an era lost to time. Although there are In excess of 8,000 hedge funds in operation today, Insider Monkey focuses on the top tier of this group, about 525 funds. It is assumed that this group controls most of the smart money’s total capital, and by paying attention to their highest performing stock picks, we’ve determined a few investment strategies that have historically outstripped Mr. Market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy outperformed the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per year for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve began to sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have beaten the S&P 500 index by 33 percentage points in 11 months (explore the details and some picks here).
Equally as necessary, optimistic insider trading activity is a second way to look at the investments you’re interested in. Just as you’d expect, there are many reasons for an upper level exec to drop shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would behave bullishly. Many academic studies have demonstrated the market-beating potential of this strategy if investors know what to do (learn more here).
Furthermore, it’s important to examine the recent info for Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH).
Hedge fund activity in Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH)
In preparation for the third quarter, a total of 17 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of 113% from the first quarter. With the smart money’s positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists an “upper tier” of notable hedge fund managers who were upping their stakes considerably.
As aggregate interest spiked, particular hedge funds were breaking ground themselves. Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, initiated the biggest position in Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH). Renaissance Technologies had 25.9 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Ken Fisher’s Fisher Asset Management also made a $13 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with brand new PCH positions are Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management, Israel Englander’s Millennium Management, and D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw.
Insider trading activity in Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH)
Bullish insider trading is best served when the company in question has experienced transactions within the past half-year. Over the latest six-month time frame, Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH) has seen zero unique insiders purchasing, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
We’ll also review the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Potlatch Corporation (NASDAQ:PCH). These stocks are CubeSmart (NYSE:CUBE), DCT Industrial Trust Inc. (NYSE:DCT), Eastgroup Properties Inc (NYSE:EGP), Sovran Self Storage Inc (NYSE:SSS), and First Industrial Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE:FR). This group of stocks are in the reit – industrial industry and their market caps are similar to PCH’s market cap.
