Is Southern Co (SO) A Good Stock To Buy?

Now that we’ve mentioned the most bullish investors, let’s also take a look at some funds that cut their entire stakes in the stock during the third quarter. It’s worth mentioning that Benjamin A. Smith’s Laurion Capital Management cut the biggest investment of the 700 funds followed by Insider Monkey, comprising about $80.4 million in call options. Glenn Russell Dubin’s fund, Highbridge Capital Management, also cut its stock, about $37.2 million worth.

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as The Southern Company (NYSE:SO) but similarly valued. These stocks are American Tower Corp (NYSE:AMT), UBS AG (USA) (NYSE:UBS), Dominion Resources, Inc. (NYSE:D), and Express Scripts Holding Company (NASDAQ:ESRX). This group of stocks’ market valuations are similar to SO’s market valuation.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 32 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $1.58 billion. That figure was $568 million in SO’s case. Express Scripts Holding Company (NASDAQ:ESRX) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand UBS AG (USA) (NYSE:UBS) is the least popular one with only 8 bullish hedge fund positions. The Southern Company (NYSE:SO) 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 ESRX might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.

Disclosure: None