Is ITT Inc. (ITT) Going to Burn These Hedge Funds?

As one would reasonably expect, key money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. Renaissance Technologies, led by Jim Simons, assembled the most outsized position in ITT Corp (NYSE:ITT). Renaissance Technologies had $7.1 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Wojciech Uzdelewicz’s Espalier Global Management also made a $3.6 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with brand new ITT positions are Gregg Moskowitz’s Interval Partners, Matthew Tewksbury’s Stevens Capital Management, and Michael Platt and William Reeves’ BlueCrest Capital Mgmt..

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as ITT Corp (NYSE:ITT) but similarly valued. These stocks are PS Business Parks Inc (NYSE:PSB), Brookdale Senior Living, Inc. (NYSE:BKD), Cantel Medical Corp. (NYSE:CMN), and Catalent Inc (NYSE:CTLT). This group of stocks’ market valuations are closest to ITT’s market valuation.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 19 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $340 million. That figure was $181 million in ITT’s case. Brookdale Senior Living, Inc. (NYSE:BKD) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand PS Business Parks Inc (NYSE:PSB) is the least popular one with only 7 bullish hedge fund positions. ITT Corp (NYSE:ITT) is not the least popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still below average. This is a slightly negative signal and we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard BKD might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.

Disclosure: None