Should You Avoid CNOOC Ltd (ADR) (CEO)?

Page 2 of 2

Seeing as CNOOC Ltd (ADR) (NYSE:CEO) has gone through declining sentiment from the smart money, it’s safe to say that there exists a select few fund managers that decided to sell off their full holdings heading into Q4. Interestingly, Michael Platt and William Reeves’ BlueCrest Capital Mgmt. dropped the largest stake of all the hedgies followed by Insider Monkey, totaling about $177.9 million in stock. David Kowitz and Sheldon Kasowitz’s fund, Indus Capital, also said goodbye to its stock, about $11.2 million worth of shares.

Let’s check out hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to CNOOC Ltd (ADR) (NYSE:CEO). We will take a look at First Cash Financial Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:FCFS), Lakeland Financial Corporation (NASDAQ:LKFN), Shenandoah Telecommunications Company (NASDAQ:SHEN), and Petrobras Argentina SA ADR (NYSE:PZE). This group of stocks’ market values are similar to CEO’s market value.

Ticker No of HFs with positions Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) Change in HF Position
FCFS 14 145967 5
LKFN 8 7818 2
SHEN 11 45982 3
PZE 8 10710 -1

As you can see these stocks had an average of 10 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $53 million. That figure was $100 million in CEO’s case. First Cash Financial Services, Inc. (NASDAQ:FCFS) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Lakeland Financial Corporation (NASDAQ:LKFN) is the least popular one with only 8 bullish hedge fund positions. CNOOC Ltd (ADR) (NYSE:CEO) 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 FCFS might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.

Disclosure: None


Page 2 of 2