Is CLGX A Good Stock To Buy Now?

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 817 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 September 30th, about a month before the elections. In this article we look at what those investors think of Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX).

Is CLGX a good stock to buy now? Prominent investors were in a bullish mood. The number of bullish hedge fund bets increased by 10 in recent months. Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX) was in 45 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2020. The all time high for this statistic is 35. This means the bullish number of hedge fund positions in this stock currently sits at its all time high. Our calculations also showed that CLGX isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings and see the video for a quick look at the top 5 stocks). There were 35 hedge funds in our database with CLGX holdings at the end of June.

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

To the average investor there are several signals stock market investors put to use to evaluate their holdings. A duo of the most under-the-radar signals are hedge fund and insider trading signals. We have shown that, historically, those who follow the top picks of the best hedge fund managers can beat the S&P 500 by a superb amount (see the details here).

Matthew Halbower Pentwater Capital

Matthew Halbower of Pentwater Capital

At Insider Monkey we leave no stone unturned when looking for the next great investment idea. For example, the House passed a landmark bill decriminalizing marijuana. So, we are checking out this under the radar cannabis stock right now. We go through lists like the 15 best blue chip stocks to buy to pick the best large-cap stocks to buy. Even though we recommend positions in only a tiny fraction of the companies we analyze, we check out as many stocks as we can. We read hedge fund investor letters and listen to stock pitches at hedge fund conferences. You can subscribe to our free daily newsletter on our website. With all of this in mind we’re going to review the key hedge fund action surrounding Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX).

Do Hedge Funds Think CLGX Is A Good Stock To Buy Now?

At third quarter’s end, a total of 45 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of 29% from the previous quarter. On the other hand, there were a total of 31 hedge funds with a bullish position in CLGX a year ago. With the smart money’s sentiment swirling, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were increasing their holdings substantially (or already accumulated large positions).

The largest stake in Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX) was held by Senator Investment Group, which reported holding $373.5 million worth of stock at the end of September. It was followed by MFN Partners with a $203 million position. Other investors bullish on the company included Pentwater Capital Management, TIG Advisors, and Nitorum Capital. In terms of the portfolio weights assigned to each position MFN Partners allocated the biggest weight to Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX), around 16.6% of its 13F portfolio. Senator Investment Group is also relatively very bullish on the stock, earmarking 10.89 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to CLGX.

As aggregate interest increased, key money managers have jumped into Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX) headfirst. Pentwater Capital Management, managed by Matthew Halbower, created the biggest position in Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX). Pentwater Capital Management had $156.6 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. James Dinan’s York Capital Management also initiated a $65.1 million position during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new CLGX investors: Simon Sadler’s Segantii Capital, Michael A. Price and Amos Meron’s Empyrean Capital Partners, and Dmitry Balyasny’s Balyasny Asset Management.

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX) but similarly valued. These stocks are BWX Technologies Inc (NYSE:BWXT), Pearson PLC (NYSE:PSO), CACI International Inc (NYSE:CACI), Planet Fitness Inc (NYSE:PLNT), HUYA Inc. (NYSE:HUYA), Comerica Incorporated (NYSE:CMA), and Elbit Systems Ltd. (NASDAQ:ESLT). This group of stocks’ market caps are closest to CLGX’s market cap.

Ticker No of HFs with positions Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) Change in HF Position
BWXT 21 166407 -6
PSO 5 16445 -2
CACI 31 575408 -3
PLNT 45 1552569 1
HUYA 22 390686 1
CMA 30 453794 -6
ESLT 4 10024 0
Average 22.6 452190 -2.1

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 22.6 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $452 million. That figure was $1712 million in CLGX’s case. Planet Fitness Inc (NYSE:PLNT) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Elbit Systems Ltd. (NASDAQ:ESLT) is the least popular one with only 4 bullish hedge fund positions. Corelogic Inc (NYSE:CLGX) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for CLGX is 90. 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. Our calculations showed that top 20 most popular stocks among hedge funds returned 41.3% in 2019 and outperformed the S&P 500 ETF (SPY) by 10 percentage points. These stocks gained 32.9% in 2020 through December 8th and still beat the market by 16.2 percentage points. Hedge funds were also right about betting on CLGX as the stock returned 16% since the end of Q3 (through 12/8) and outperformed the market. Hedge funds were rewarded for their relative bullishness.

Follow Corelogic Inc. (NYSE:CLGX)

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