After several tireless days we have finished crunching the numbers from nearly 900 13F filings issued by the elite hedge funds and other investment firms that we track at Insider Monkey, which disclosed those firms’ equity portfolios as of September 30th. The results of that effort will be put on display in this article, as we share valuable insight into the smart money sentiment towards Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX).
Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX) has experienced a decrease in support from the world’s most elite money managers lately. Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX) was in 35 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of September. The all time high for this statistic is 38. Our calculations also showed that NVAX isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings).
Noam Gottesman of GLG Partners
At Insider Monkey, we scour multiple sources to uncover the next great investment idea. For example, lithium prices have more than doubled over the past year, so we go through lists like the 10 best EV stocks 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. Now we’re going to review the fresh hedge fund action encompassing Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX).
Do Hedge Funds Think NVAX Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?
Heading into the fourth quarter of 2021, a total of 35 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a change of -5% from the previous quarter. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards NVAX over the last 25 quarters. With hedgies’ capital changing hands, there exists a select group of noteworthy hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes substantially (or already accumulated large positions).
Among these funds, RA Capital Management held the most valuable stake in Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX), which was worth $434.9 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was Citadel Investment Group which amassed $197.1 million worth of shares. Rock Springs Capital Management, Partner Fund Management, and Citadel Investment Group 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 RA Capital Management allocated the biggest weight to Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX), around 6.03% of its 13F portfolio. Samsara BioCapital is also relatively very bullish on the stock, earmarking 2.69 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to NVAX.
Because Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX) has faced a decline in interest from the smart money, we can see that there lies a certain “tier” of fund managers that decided to sell off their positions entirely heading into Q4. At the top of the heap, Brian Ashford-Russell and Tim Woolley’s Polar Capital dumped the biggest stake of all the hedgies tracked by Insider Monkey, valued at about $19.1 million in stock. Albert Cha and Frank Kung’s fund, Vivo Capital, also dropped its stock, about $18.7 million worth. These moves are intriguing to say the least, as total hedge fund interest dropped by 2 funds heading into Q4.
Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX). These stocks are Royalty Pharma Plc (NASDAQ:RPRX), GrubHub Inc (NYSE:GRUB), United Airlines Holdings Inc (NYSE:UAL), Sociedad Quimica y Minera (NYSE:SQM), Paylocity Holding Corp (NASDAQ:PCTY), Nomura Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:NMR), and The AES Corporation (NYSE:AES). This group of stocks’ market caps match NVAX’s market cap.
| Ticker | No of HFs with positions | Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) | Change in HF Position |
|---|---|---|---|
| RPRX | 20 | 1961787 | 0 |
| GRUB | 18 | 204963 | -6 |
| UAL | 30 | 403253 | -9 |
| SQM | 26 | 211676 | 7 |
| PCTY | 27 | 740385 | 8 |
| NMR | 6 | 19317 | -1 |
| AES | 47 | 1481369 | 8 |
| Average | 24.9 | 717536 | 1 |
View table here if you experience formatting issues.
As you can see these stocks had an average of 24.9 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $718 million. That figure was $787 million in NVAX’s case. The AES Corporation (NYSE:AES) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Nomura Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:NMR) is the least popular one with only 6 bullish hedge fund positions. Novavax, Inc. (NASDAQ:NVAX) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for NVAX is 66. 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 28.6% in 2021 through November 30th and beat the market again by 5.6 percentage points. Unfortunately NVAX wasn’t nearly as popular as these 5 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on NVAX were disappointed as the stock returned 0.6% since the end of September (through 11/30) 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.
Follow Novavax Inc (NASDAQ:NVAX)
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Disclosure: None. This article was originally published at Insider Monkey.
