Monster Worldwide, Inc. (MWW): Are Hedge Funds Right About This Stock?

Should investors be bullish on Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW)?

Now, according to many of your fellow readers, hedge funds are perceived as bloated, old investment tools of a forgotten age. Although there are In excess of 8,000 hedge funds trading today, this site looks at the bigwigs of this group, about 525 funds. Analysts calculate that this group has its hands on the lion’s share of the smart money’s total assets, and by keeping an eye on their highest performing equity investments, we’ve found a few investment strategies that have historically beaten Mr. Market. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy beat the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per year for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve began to sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have outperformed the S&P 500 index by 33 percentage points in 11 months (explore the details and some picks here).

Equally as key, bullish insider trading activity is another way to look at the marketplace. As the old adage goes: there are a variety of reasons for an executive to cut shares of his or her company, but just one, very obvious reason why they would behave bullishly. Various academic studies have demonstrated the useful potential of this method if “monkeys” know what to do (learn more here).

Now that that’s out of the way, it’s important to discuss the latest info for Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW).

Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW)

What have hedge funds been doing with Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW)?

In preparation for the third quarter, a total of 17 of the hedge funds we track held long positions in this stock, a change of 0% from the first quarter. With hedge funds’ positions undergoing their usual ebb and flow, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were upping their holdings significantly.

When using filings from the hedgies we track, Richard S. Pzena’s Pzena Investment Management had the biggest position in Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW), worth close to $18.5 million, comprising 0.1% of its total 13F portfolio. On Pzena Investment Management’s heels is Chuck Royce of Royce & Associates, with a $8.8 million position; less than 0.1%% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the company. Some other hedge funds that hold long positions include D. E. Shaw’s D E Shaw, Robert Pitts’s Steadfast Capital Management and Matthew Hulsizer’s PEAK6 Capital Management.

Because Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW) has faced dropping sentiment from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, we can see that there was a specific group of fund managers that elected to cut their positions entirely last quarter. At the top of the heap, George Soros’s Soros Fund Management said goodbye to the biggest position of all the hedgies we watch, totaling close to $5.1 million in stock. Jay Petschek and Steven Major’s fund, Corsair Capital Management, also dropped its stock, about $0.8 million worth. These moves are intriguing to say the least, as total hedge fund interest stayed the same (this is a bearish signal in our experience).

What have insiders been doing with Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW)?

Insider buying is best served when the company in question has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the latest half-year time frame, Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW) has seen zero unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

We’ll go over the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW). These stocks are Lamar Advertising Co (NASDAQ:LAMR), Focus Media Holding Limited (ADR) (NASDAQ:FMCN), Charm Communications Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:CHRM), VisionChina Media Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:VISN), and ReachLocal Inc. (NASDAQ:RLOC). This group of stocks belong to the advertising agencies industry and their market caps match MWW’s market cap.

Company Name # of Hedge Funds # of Insiders Buying # of Insiders Selling
Lamar Advertising Co (NASDAQ:LAMR) 45 0 0
Focus Media Holding Limited (ADR) (NASDAQ:FMCN) 0 0
Charm Communications Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:CHRM) 0 0
VisionChina Media Inc (ADR) (NASDAQ:VISN) 4 0 0
ReachLocal Inc. (NASDAQ:RLOC) 5 0 0

Using the results shown by the previously mentioned research, average investors should always pay attention to hedge fund and insider trading sentiment, and Monster Worldwide, Inc. (NYSE:MWW) is no exception.

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