Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NVO)Hedge Funds Are Snapping Up

After several tireless days we have finished crunching the numbers from the more than 700 13F filings issued by the successful hedge funds and other investment firms that we track at Insider Monkey, which disclosed those firms’ equity portfolios as of September 30. The results of that effort will be put on display in this article, as we share valuable insight into the smart money sentiment towards Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NYSE:NVO) .

Is Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NYSE:NVO) a buy right now? Money managers are in an optimistic mood. The number of long hedge fund bets that are revealed through the 13F filings increased by 3 recently. NVOwas in 15 hedge funds’ portfolios at the end of September. There were 12 hedge funds in our database with NVO positions at the end of the previous quarter. The level and the change in hedge fund popularity aren’t the only variables you need to analyze to decipher hedge funds’ perspectives. A stock may witness a boost in popularity but it may still be less popular than similarly priced stocks. That’s why at the end of this article we will examine companies such as Bank of America Corp (NYSE:BAC), Taiwan Semiconductor Mfg. Co. Ltd. (ADR) (NYSE:TSM), and Altria Group Inc (NYSE:MO) to gather more data points.

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How have hedgies been trading Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NYSE:NVO)?

At Q3’s end, a total of 15 of the hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey held long positions in this stock, a gain of 25% from the previous quarter. Below, you can check out the change in hedge fund sentiment towards NVO over the last 5 quarters. So, let’s check out which hedge funds were among the top holders of the stock and which hedge funds were making big moves.

According to publicly available hedge fund and institutional investor holdings data compiled by Insider Monkey, Jim Simons’ Renaissance Technologies holds the most valuable position in Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NYSE:NVO). Renaissance Technologies has a $609.4 million position in the stock, comprising 1.1% of its 13F portfolio. Sitting at the No. 2 spot is Fisher Asset Management, led by Ken Fisher, holding a $453.8 million position. Other peers that are bullish include Israel Englander’s Millennium Management, Tom Gayner’s Markel Gayner Asset Management and Jerome Pfund and Michael Sjostrom’s Sectoral Asset Management. We should note that none of these hedge funds are among our list of the 100 best performing hedge funds which is based on the performance of their 13F long positions in non-microcap stocks.

As aggregate interest increased, specific money managers were leading the bulls’ herd. Two Sigma Advisors, led by John Overdeck and David Siegel, assembled the largest position in Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NYSE:NVO). Two Sigma Advisors had $11.6 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Paul Marshall and Ian Wace’s Marshall Wace LLP also made a $7.4 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The following funds were also among the new NVO investors: Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group, Mike Vranos’ Ellington, and Gavin Saitowitz and Cisco J. del Valle’s Springbok Capital.

Let’s also examine hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NYSE:NVO). We will take a look at Bank of America Corp (NYSE:BAC), Taiwan Semiconductor Mfg. Co. Ltd. (ADR) (NYSE:TSM), Altria Group Inc (NYSE:MO), and UnitedHealth Group Inc. (NYSE:UNH). All of these stocks’ market caps resemble NVO’s market cap.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 59 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $3.61 billion. That figure was $1.25 billion in NVO’s case. Bank of America Corp (NYSE:BAC) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Taiwan Semiconductor Mfg. Co. Ltd. (ADR) (NYSE:TSM) is the least popular one with only 31 bullish hedge fund positions. Compared to these stocks Novo Nordisk A/S (ADR) (NYSE:NVO) is even less popular than TSM. Considering that hedge funds aren’t fond of this stock in relation to other companies analyzed in this article, it may be a good idea to analyze it in detail and understand why the smart money isn’t behind this stock. This isn’t necessarily bad news. Although it is possible that hedge funds may think the stock is overpriced and view the stock as a short candidate, they may not be very familiar with the bullish thesis. In either case more research is warranted.

Disclosure: None