Hedge Funds Aren’t Crazy About Westmoreland Coal Company (WLB) Anymore

Due to the fact that Westmoreland Coal Company (NASDAQ:WLB) has witnessed declining sentiment from the smart money, we can see that there lies a certain “tier” of money managers that slashed their entire stakes heading into Q4. Intriguingly, Dan Sobol and Lisa Hess’s SkyTop Capital Management said goodbye to the biggest position of all the hedgies monitored by Insider Monkey, comprising an estimated $4.9 million in stock. Michael Reeber’s fund, Andalusian Capital Partners, also said goodbye to its stake, about $4.3 million worth of WLB shares. These moves are important to note, as total hedge fund interest dropped by 2 funds heading into Q4.

Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Westmoreland Coal Company (NASDAQ:WLB) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Territorial Bancorp Inc (NASDAQ:TBNK), Armada Hoffler Properties Inc (NYSE:AHH), CIBER, Inc. (NYSE:CBR), and OraSure Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:OSUR). This group of stocks’ market caps are closest to WLB’s market cap.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 14 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $27 million. That figure was $96 million in WLB’s case. OraSure Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:OSUR) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Territorial Bancorp Inc (NASDAQ:TBNK) is the least popular one with only 8 bullish hedge fund positions. Westmoreland Coal Company (NASDAQ:WLB) is not the most popular stock in this group, but hedge fund interest is still above average. This is a slightly positive signal, but we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard OSUR might be a better candidate to consider a long position.