Newcastle Investment Corp. (NCT) Hedge Funds Are Snapping Up

As one would reasonably expect, some big names were leading the bulls’ herd. Renaissance Technologies assembled the most outsized position in Newcastle Investment Corp. (NYSE:NCT). Arrowstreet Capital also made a $1.2 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with new positions in the stock are Israel Englander’s Millennium Management and Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group.

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Newcastle Investment Corp. (NYSE:NCT). These stocks are Fidus Investment Corp (NASDAQ:FDUS), WashingtonFirst Bankshares Inc (NASDAQ:WFBI), Gain Capital Holdings Inc (NYSE:GCAP), and Boot Barn Holdings Inc (NYSE:BOOT). This group of stocks’ market valuations resemble NCT’s market valuation.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 7 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $27 million. That figure was $7 million in NCT’s case. Gain Capital Holdings Inc (NYSE:GCAP) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand WashingtonFirst Bankshares Inc (NASDAQ:WFBI) is the least popular one with only 4 bullish hedge fund positions. Newcastle Investment Corp. (NYSE:NCT) 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 GCAP might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.

Disclosure: None