Is IAC/InterActiveCorp (IAC) A Good Stock To Buy?

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. Insider Monkey finished processing 867 13F filings submitted by hedge funds and prominent investors. These filings show these funds’ portfolio positions as of September 30th, 2021. What do these smart investors think about IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC)?

Is IAC a good stock to buy now? IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC) was in 47 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2021. The all time high for this statistic is 72. IAC shareholders have witnessed a decrease in activity from the world’s largest hedge funds recently. There were 50 hedge funds in our database with IAC holdings at the end of June. Our calculations also showed that IAC isn’t among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q3 rankings).

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. Keeping this in mind we’re going to take a glance at the new hedge fund action regarding IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC).

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

At Q3’s end, a total of 47 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey were long this stock, a change of -6% from the second quarter of 2021. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards IAC over the last 25 quarters. With the smart money’s positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes significantly (or already accumulated large positions).

Among these funds, ShawSpring Partners held the most valuable stake in IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC), which was worth $378.7 million at the end of the third quarter. On the second spot was Southeastern Asset Management which amassed $217.5 million worth of shares. Echo Street Capital Management, Harspring Capital Management, and Freshford 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 ShawSpring Partners allocated the biggest weight to IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC), around 39.51% of its 13F portfolio. Harspring Capital Management is also relatively very bullish on the stock, dishing out 10.3 percent of its 13F equity portfolio to IAC.

Due to the fact that IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC) has faced a decline in interest from the aggregate hedge fund industry, it’s easy to see that there was a specific group of hedgies that slashed their entire stakes last quarter. Intriguingly, Brandon Haley’s Holocene Advisors sold off the biggest position of the “upper crust” of funds watched by Insider Monkey, comprising an estimated $93.6 million in stock. Jason McDougall’s fund, 11 Capital Partners, also sold off its stock, about $14.7 million worth. These moves are intriguing to say the least, as aggregate hedge fund interest was cut by 3 funds last quarter.

Let’s now take a look at hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Aegon N.V. (NYSE:AEG), Tapestry, Inc. (NYSE:TPR), Watsco Inc (NYSE:WSO), agilon health inc. (NYSE:AGL), Oak Street Health, Inc. (NYSE:OSH), QuantumScape Corporation (NYSE:QS), and CureVac N.V. (NASDAQ:CVAC). This group of stocks’ market caps are similar to IAC’s market cap.

View table here if you experience formatting issues.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 21.1 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $318 million. That figure was $1427 million in IAC’s case. Tapestry, Inc. (NYSE:TPR) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Aegon N.V. (NYSE:AEG) is the least popular one with only 5 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks IAC/InterActiveCorp (NASDAQ:IAC) is more popular among hedge funds. Our overall hedge fund sentiment score for IAC is 71.6. 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 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 still beat the market by 5.6 percentage points. Unfortunately IAC wasn’t nearly as popular as these 5 stocks and hedge funds that were betting on IAC were disappointed as the stock returned 2.6% since the end of the third quarter (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 most of these stocks already outperformed the market since 2019.

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