Hedge Funds Are Selling China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (CBPO)

Insider Monkey has processed numerous 13F filings of hedge funds and successful value investors to create an extensive database of hedge fund holdings. The 13F filings show the hedge funds’ and successful investors’ positions as of the end of the first quarter. You can find articles about an individual hedge fund’s trades on numerous financial news websites. However, in this article we will take a look at their collective moves over the last 4.5 years and analyze what the smart money thinks of China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO) based on that data.

China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO) has experienced a decrease in hedge fund sentiment recently. Our calculations also showed that CBPO isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q1 rankings and see the video for a quick look at the top 5 stocks).

Video: Watch our video about the top 5 most popular hedge fund stocks.

If you’d ask most shareholders, hedge funds are viewed as slow, outdated investment tools of yesteryear. While there are greater than 8000 funds in operation today, We hone in on the bigwigs of this group, approximately 850 funds. These investment experts direct the lion’s share of all hedge funds’ total capital, and by keeping an eye on their first-class picks, Insider Monkey has come up with numerous investment strategies that have historically beaten Mr. Market. Insider Monkey’s flagship short hedge fund strategy surpassed the S&P 500 short ETFs by around 20 percentage points a year since its inception in March 2017. Our portfolio of short stocks lost 36% since February 2017 (through May 18th) even though the market was up 30% during the same period. We just shared a list of 8 short targets in our latest quarterly update .

At Insider Monkey we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, We take a look at lists like the 10 stocks that went up during the 2008 crash to identify the companies that are likely to deliver double digit returns in up and down markets. We interview hedge fund managers and ask them about their best ideas. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. For example we are checking out stocks recommended/scorned by legendary Bill Miller. Our best call in 2020 was shorting the market when the S&P 500 was trading at 3150 in February after realizing the coronavirus pandemic’s significance before most investors. Now we’re going to take a glance at the new hedge fund action regarding China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO).

How are hedge funds trading China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO)?

At the end of the first quarter, a total of 16 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were bullish on this stock, a change of -16% from the fourth quarter of 2019. On the other hand, there were a total of 8 hedge funds with a bullish position in CBPO a year ago. So, let’s review which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

Among these funds, Hillhouse Capital Management held the most valuable stake in China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO), which was worth $296.9 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was Maso Capital which amassed $100.2 million worth of shares. York Capital Management, Sand Grove Capital Partners, and Renaissance Technologies were also very fond of the stock, becoming one of the largest hedge fund holders of the company. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position Maso Capital allocated the biggest weight to China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO), around 25.94% of its 13F portfolio. Sand Grove Capital Partners is also relatively very bullish on the stock, earmarking 7.88 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to CBPO.

Because China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO) has witnessed bearish sentiment from the aggregate hedge fund industry, it’s safe to say that there were a few hedgies who were dropping their positions entirely heading into Q4. It’s worth mentioning that Gifford Combs’s Dalton Investments dumped the largest stake of the 750 funds watched by Insider Monkey, worth an estimated $1.8 million in stock, and Gavin Saitowitz and Cisco J. del Valle’s Springbok Capital was right behind this move, as the fund cut about $0.9 million worth. These moves are intriguing to say the least, as aggregate hedge fund interest fell by 3 funds heading into Q4.

Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Gold Fields Limited (NYSE:GFI), Comerica Incorporated (NYSE:CMA), Beyond Meat, Inc. (NASDAQ:BYND), and Syneos Health, Inc. (NASDAQ:SYNH). This group of stocks’ market valuations match CBPO’s market valuation.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 22.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $181 million. That figure was $613 million in CBPO’s case. Comerica Incorporated (NYSE:CMA) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Beyond Meat, Inc. (NASDAQ:BYND) is the least popular one with only 13 bullish hedge fund positions. China Biologic Products Holdings Inc (NASDAQ:CBPO) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. Our calculations showed that top 10 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 41.4% in 2019 and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 10.1 percentage points. These stocks gained 13.3% in 2020 through June 25th and surpassed the market by 16.8 percentage points. Unfortunately CBPO wasn’t nearly as popular as these 10 stocks (hedge fund sentiment was quite bearish); CBPO investors were disappointed as the stock returned -0.5% during the second quarter and underperformed the market. If you are interested in investing in large cap stocks with huge upside potential, you should check out the top 10 most popular stocks among hedge funds as most of these stocks already outperformed the market in 2020.

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