Should You Avoid VF Corp (VFC)?

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Since VF Corp (NYSE:VFC) has witnessed a decline in interest from the smart money, we can see that there was a specific group of hedgies that slashed their entire stakes heading into fourth quarter. It’s worth mentioning that Joel Greenblatt’s Gotham Asset Management dropped the largest position of all the hedgies watched by Insider Monkey, worth an estimated $34.5 million in call options, and Alexander Mitchell’s Scopus Asset Management was right behind this move, as the fund cut about $18.4 million worth of shares. These bearish behaviors are important to note, as aggregate hedge fund interest fell by 1 fund heading into fourth quarter.

Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to VF Corp (NYSE:VFC). We will take a look at PPL Corporation (NYSE:PPL), Deere & Company (NYSE:DE), Cardinal Health, Inc. (NYSE:CAH), and Edison International (NYSE:EIX). This group of stocks’ market valuations are closest to VFC’s market valuation.

Ticker No of HFs with positions Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) Change in HF Position
PPL 22 536205 -4
DE 27 3324122 -6
CAH 26 666390 -8
EIX 19 640459 -1

As you can see these stocks had an average of 23.5 hedge funds with bullish positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $1.29 billion. That figure was $375 million in VFC’s case. Deere & Company (NYSE:DE) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Edison International (NYSE:EIX) is the least popular one with only 19 bullish hedge fund positions. VF Corp (NYSE:VFC) 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 DE might be a better candidate to consider a long position in.

Disclosure: None

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