Is Sonoco Products Co (SON) A Good Stock To Buy?

Now, some big names were leading the bulls’ herd. Renaissance Technologies, led by Jim Simons, assembled the largest position in Sonoco Products Co (NYSE:SON). Renaissance Technologies had $0.9 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group also made a $0.3 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The only other fund with a new position in the stock is John Overdeck and David Siegel’s Two Sigma Advisors.

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Sonoco Products Co (NYSE:SON) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Vail Resorts, Inc. (NYSE:MTN), AptarGroup, Inc. (NYSE:ATR), Watsco Inc (NYSE:WSO), and Orbital ATK Inc (NYSE:OA). This group of stocks’ market valuations resemble SON’s market valuation.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 24.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $312 million. That figure was $88 million in SON’s case. Vail Resorts, Inc. (NYSE:MTN) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand AptarGroup, Inc. (NYSE:ATR) is the least popular one with only 12 bullish hedge fund positions. Sonoco Products Co (NYSE:SON) 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 MTN might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.