Is Zoetis Inc (ZTS) A Good Stock To Buy?

Since Zoetis Inc (NYSE:ZTS) has experienced bearish sentiment from the smart money, logic holds that there is a sect of funds who sold off their full holdings by the end of the third quarter. Intriguingly, Jean-Marie Eveillard’s First Eagle Investment Management dropped the biggest position of all the hedgies watched by Insider Monkey, worth close to $98.4 million in stock. Dmitry Balyasny’s fund, Balyasny Asset Management, also said goodbye to its stock, about $18.5 million worth. These bearish behaviors are intriguing to say the least, as total hedge fund interest was cut by 2 funds by the end of the third quarter.

Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks – not necessarily in the same industry as Zoetis Inc (NYSE:ZTS) but similarly valued. We will take a look at Luxottica Group SpA (ADR) (NYSE:LUX), Charter Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ:CHTR), AutoZone, Inc. (NYSE:AZO), and Telefonica Brasil SA (ADR) (NYSE:VIV). All of these stocks’ market caps match ZTS’s market cap.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 41.25 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $4.99 billion. That figure was $2.24 billion in ZTS’s case. Charter Communications, Inc. (NASDAQ:CHTR) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Luxottica Group SpA (ADR) (NYSE:LUX) is the least popular one with only 3 bullish hedge fund positions. Zoetis Inc (NYSE:ZTS) is not the most popular stock in this group but hedge fund interest is still above average. This is a slightly positive signal but we’d rather spend our time researching stocks that hedge funds are piling on. In this regard CHTR might be a better candidate to consider a long position.