Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A) was in 31 hedge funds’ portfolio at the end of the first quarter of 2013. A investors should pay attention to a decrease in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds recently. There were 36 hedge funds in our database with A positions at the end of the previous quarter.
If you’d ask most stock holders, hedge funds are viewed as unimportant, old investment tools of yesteryear. While there are more than 8000 funds trading at present, we choose to focus on the masters of this group, around 450 funds. It is widely believed that this group has its hands on the majority of the smart money’s total capital, and by watching their best stock picks, we have figured out a number of investment strategies that have historically beaten Mr. Market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy outpaced the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points a year for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve began to sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have outpaced the S&P 500 index by 23.3 percentage points in 8 months (see all of our picks from August).
Equally as important, optimistic insider trading sentiment is a second way to parse down the world of equities. Obviously, there are many stimuli for a corporate insider to get rid of shares of his or her company, but only one, very obvious reason why they would buy. Several empirical studies have demonstrated the valuable potential of this method if piggybackers understand where to look (learn more here).
Keeping this in mind, let’s take a gander at the latest action regarding Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A).
How are hedge funds trading Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A)?
At the end of the first quarter, a total of 31 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of -14% from the first quarter. With hedge funds’ capital changing hands, there exists an “upper tier” of key hedge fund managers who were boosting their holdings significantly.
According to our comprehensive database, Edgar Wachenheim’s Greenhaven Associates had the biggest position in Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A), worth close to $159.4 million, accounting for 4.4% of its total 13F portfolio. On Greenhaven Associates’s heels is Doug Silverman and Alexander Klabin of Senator Investment Group, with a $132.2 million position; the fund has 1.6% of its 13F portfolio invested in the stock. Remaining hedge funds that are bullish include Dinakar Singh’s TPG-AXON Management LP, Jean-Marie Eveillard’s First Eagle Investment Management and Robert Pohly’s Samlyn Capital.
Seeing as Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A) has experienced a declination in interest from the smart money, it’s safe to say that there is a sect of hedge funds who were dropping their positions entirely last quarter. Interestingly, Doug Silverman and Alexander Klabin’s Senator Investment Group dropped the biggest stake of all the hedgies we monitor, worth an estimated $81.9 million in call options, and Jim Simons of Renaissance Technologies was right behind this move, as the fund dumped about $48.1 million worth. These transactions are important to note, as aggregate hedge fund interest fell by 5 funds last quarter.
What have insiders been doing with Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A)?
Bullish insider trading is best served when the company in focus has seen transactions within the past 180 days. Over the last 180-day time frame, Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A) has experienced zero unique insiders purchasing, and 11 insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).
Let’s go over hedge fund and insider activity in other stocks similar to Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A). These stocks are Mettler-Toledo International Inc. (NYSE:MTD), Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. (NYSE:TMO), Laboratory Corp. of America Holdings (NYSE:LH), Quest Diagnostics Inc (NYSE:DGX), and Life Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:LIFE). This group of stocks are the members of the medical laboratories & research industry and their market caps are similar to A’s market cap.
| Company Name | # of Hedge Funds | # of Insiders Buying | # of Insiders Selling |
| Mettler-Toledo International Inc. (NYSE:MTD) | 13 | 0 | 8 |
| Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. (NYSE:TMO) | 50 | 0 | 8 |
| Laboratory Corp. of America Holdings (NYSE:LH) | 25 | 0 | 6 |
| Quest Diagnostics Inc (NYSE:DGX) | 32 | 0 | 6 |
| Life Technologies Corp. (NASDAQ:LIFE) | 45 | 0 | 2 |
With the returns shown by our research, everyday investors must always pay attention to hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Agilent Technologies Inc. (NYSE:A) shareholders fit into this picture quite nicely.
