Hedge Funds Are Piling Into Hecla Mining Company (HL)

The latest 13F reporting period has come and gone, and Insider Monkey is again at the forefront when it comes to making use of this gold mine of data. We have processed the filings of the more than 873 world-class investment firms that we track and now have access to the collective wisdom contained in these filings, which are based on their June 30th holdings, data that is available nowhere else. Should you consider Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) for your portfolio? We’ll look to this invaluable collective wisdom for the answer.

Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) has seen an increase in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds in recent months. Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) was in 20 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of June. The all time high for this statistic was previously 19. This means the bullish number of hedge fund positions in this stock currently sits at its all time high. Our calculations also showed that HL isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q2 rankings).

In the eyes of most market participants, hedge funds are assumed to be worthless, outdated investment tools of yesteryear. While there are more than 8000 funds in operation today, Our experts choose to focus on the top tier of this group, approximately 850 funds. It is estimated that this group of investors command the lion’s share of the smart money’s total asset base, and by shadowing their best picks, Insider Monkey has uncovered many investment strategies that have historically exceeded the S&P 500 index. Insider Monkey’s flagship short hedge fund strategy outperformed the S&P 500 short ETFs by around 20 percentage points per annum since its inception in March 2017. Also, our monthly newsletter’s portfolio of long stock picks returned 185.4% since March 2017 (through August 2021) and beat the S&P 500 Index by more than 79 percentage points. You can download a sample issue of this newsletter on our website.

Scott Bessent of Key Square Capital Management

Scott Bessent of Key Square Capital Management

At Insider Monkey, we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, plant based food market is expected to explode 100-fold by 2050, so we are checking out this under-the-radar stock. We go through lists like the 10 best growth stocks to buy to pick the next Tesla that will deliver a 10x return. Even though we recommend positions in only a tiny fraction of the companies we analyze, we check out as many stocks as we can. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. You can subscribe to our free daily newsletter on our homepage. Now let’s go over the new hedge fund action encompassing Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL).

Do Hedge Funds Think HL Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?

At Q2’s end, a total of 20 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of 25% from the previous quarter. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards HL over the last 24 quarters. With hedge funds’ sentiment swirling, there exists a few noteworthy hedge fund managers who were adding to their stakes considerably (or already accumulated large positions).

The largest stake in Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) was held by Renaissance Technologies, which reported holding $24.7 million worth of stock at the end of June. It was followed by Citadel Investment Group with a $16.5 million position. Other investors bullish on the company included D E Shaw, Sprott Asset Management, and Key Square Capital Management. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Key Square Capital Management allocated the biggest weight to Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL), around 1.8% of its 13F portfolio. Sprott Asset Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, earmarking 0.82 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to HL.

Now, key money managers were breaking ground themselves. Renaissance Technologies, assembled the biggest position in Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL). Renaissance Technologies had $24.7 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Scott Bessent’s Key Square Capital Management also made a $9.5 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new HL investors: Matthew Hulsizer’s PEAK6 Capital Management, Mark Broach’s Manatuck Hill Partners, and Ryan Tolkin (CIO)’s Schonfeld Strategic Advisors.

Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL). We will take a look at BankUnited Inc (NYSE:BKU), Physicians Realty Trust (NYSE:DOC), Iovance Biotherapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:IOVA), First Majestic Silver Corp (NYSE:AG), Enable Midstream Partners LP (NYSE:ENBL), Overstock.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:OSTK), and ACV Auctions Inc. (NASDAQ:ACVA). This group of stocks’ market values are similar to HL’s market value.

Ticker No of HFs with positions Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) Change in HF Position
BKU 13 140284 4
DOC 16 63892 -3
IOVA 30 1666448 -7
AG 11 39579 -4
ENBL 3 22671 -3
OSTK 28 255922 -3
ACVA 22 104991 -3
Average 17.6 327684 -2.7

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 17.6 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $328 million. That figure was $102 million in HL’s case. Iovance Biotherapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:IOVA) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Enable Midstream Partners LP (NYSE:ENBL) is the least popular one with only 3 bullish hedge fund positions. Hecla Mining Company (NYSE:HL) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for HL is 70.5. Stocks with higher number of hedge fund positions relative to other stocks as well as relative to their historical range receive a higher sentiment score. This is a slightly positive signal but we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. Our calculations showed that top 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 95.8% in 2019 and 2020, and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 40 percentage points. These stocks gained 24% in 2021 through October 22nd and beat the market again by 1.6 percentage points. Unfortunately HL wasn’t nearly as popular as these 5 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on HL were disappointed as the stock returned -21.3% since the end of June (through 10/22) and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 5 most popular stocks among hedge funds as many of these stocks already outperformed the market since 2019.

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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.