Hedge Funds Are Crazy About Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (SLW)

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Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW) was in 17 hedge funds’ portfolio at the end of March. SLW investors should be aware of an increase in hedge fund interest recently. There were 16 hedge funds in our database with SLW positions at the end of the previous quarter.

Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW)If you’d ask most traders, hedge funds are assumed to be unimportant, outdated financial tools of the past. While there are more than 8000 funds trading at present, we hone in on the upper echelon of this club, about 450 funds. It is widely believed that this group has its hands on the majority of the smart money’s total asset base, and by keeping an eye on their top picks, we have discovered a few investment strategies that have historically outpaced the S&P 500 index. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points a year for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve started sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have topped the S&P 500 index by 23.3 percentage points in 8 months (see all of our picks from August).

Just as beneficial, positive insider trading activity is another way to break down the investments you’re interested in. Just as you’d expect, there are many stimuli for an insider to drop shares of his or her company, but just one, very clear reason why they would buy. Various empirical studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this strategy if “monkeys” understand what to do (learn more here).

Now, it’s important to take a peek at the latest action encompassing Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW).

What have hedge funds been doing with Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW)?

Heading into Q2, a total of 17 of the hedge funds we track were bullish in this stock, a change of 6% from the previous quarter. With hedgies’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a few noteworthy hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes considerably.

Of the funds we track, Jeffrey Vinik’s Vinik Asset Management had the most valuable position in Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW), worth close to $50.5 million, accounting for 1.4% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Renaissance Technologies, managed by Jim Simons, which held a $29.1 million position; the fund has 0.1% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Other hedge funds that are bullish include Eric Sprott’s Sprott Asset Management, and Matthew Hulsizer’s PEAK6 Capital Management.

Consequently, key money managers have jumped into Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW) headfirst. Ionic Capital Management, managed by Bart Baum, established the biggest call position in Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW). Ionic Capital Management had 1.5 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Israel Englander’s Millennium Management also made a $0.5 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The only other fund with a brand new SLW position is John Overdeck and David Siegel’s Two Sigma Advisors.

Insider trading activity in Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW)

Insider purchases made by high-level executives is particularly usable when the primary stock in question has experienced transactions within the past six months. Over the latest 180-day time period, Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW) has seen zero unique insiders buying, 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 Silver Wheaton Corp. (USA) (NYSE:SLW). These stocks are Silver Standard Resources Inc. (USA) (NASDAQ:SSRI), Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL), First Majestic Silver Corp (NYSE:AG), Coeur d’Alene Mines Corporation (NYSE:CDE), and Pan American Silver Corp. (USA) (NASDAQ:PAAS). This group of stocks belong to the silver industry and their market caps resemble SLW’s market cap.

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