Hedge Funds Have Never Been This Bullish On Progyny, Inc. (PGNY)

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 at Insider Monkey have plowed through 821 13F filings that hedge funds and well-known value investors are required to file by the SEC. The 13F filings show the funds’ and investors’ portfolio positions as of March 31st, a week after the market trough. We are almost done with the second quarter. Investors decided to bet on the economic recovery and a stock market rebound. S&P 500 Index returned almost 20% this quarter. In this article we look at how hedge funds traded Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY) and determine whether the smart money was really smart about this stock.

Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY) shareholders have witnessed an increase in support from the world’s most elite money managers recently. Our calculations also showed that PGNY 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.

According to most investors, hedge funds are assumed to be underperforming, outdated investment vehicles of years past. While there are greater than 8000 funds in operation today, Our researchers choose to focus on the crème de la crème of this group, approximately 850 funds. It is estimated that this group of investors oversee the majority of the hedge fund industry’s total capital, and by shadowing their first-class investments, Insider Monkey has spotted several investment strategies that have historically exceeded the market. Insider Monkey’s flagship short hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 short ETFs by around 20 percentage points annually 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. There is a lot of volatility in the markets and this presents amazing investment opportunities from time to time. For example, this trader claims to deliver juiced up returns with one trade a week, so we are checking out his highest conviction idea. A second trader claims to score lucrative profits by utilizing a “weekend trading strategy”, so we look into his strategy’s picks. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. We recently recommended several stocks partly inspired by legendary Bill Miller’s investor letter. 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. Keeping this in mind let’s go over the recent hedge fund action surrounding Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY).

Hedge fund activity in Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY)

Heading into the second quarter of 2020, a total of 10 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 25% from one quarter earlier. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards PGNY over the last 18 quarters. So, let’s examine which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

Among these funds, Crestwood Capital Management held the most valuable stake in Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY), which was worth $7.2 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was Ogborne Capital which amassed $1.6 million worth of shares. Osterweis Capital Management, Citadel Investment Group, and McKinley Capital Management 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 Crestwood Capital Management allocated the biggest weight to Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY), around 4.65% of its 13F portfolio. Ogborne Capital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, designating 1.87 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to PGNY.

Consequently, specific money managers have been driving this bullishness. Ogborne Capital, managed by Mike Ogborne, assembled the most valuable position in Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY). Ogborne Capital had $1.6 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. John Osterweis’s Osterweis Capital Management also made a $1.2 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with new positions in the stock are Robert B. Gillam’s McKinley Capital Management and Peter Muller’s PDT Partners.

Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY). These stocks are Otter Tail Corporation (NASDAQ:OTTR), Commscope Holding Company Inc (NASDAQ:COMM), Healthcare Services Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:HCSG), and Ballard Power Systems Inc. (NASDAQ:BLDP). This group of stocks’ market caps are similar to PGNY’s market cap.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 17 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $194 million. That figure was $14 million in PGNY’s case. Commscope Holding Company Inc (NASDAQ:COMM) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Ballard Power Systems Inc. (NASDAQ:BLDP) is the least popular one with only 10 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks Progyny, Inc. (NASDAQ:PGNY) is even less popular than BLDP. 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 12.3% in 2020 through June 30th but managed to beat the market by 15.5 percentage points. A small number of hedge funds were also right about betting on PGNY, though not to the same extent, as the stock returned 21.8% during the second quarter and outperformed the market as well.

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