Should You Buy United Financial Bancorp Inc (UBNK)?

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As one would reasonably expect, some big names have been driving this bullishness. Castine Capital Management, led by Paul Magidson, Jonathan Cohen. And Ostrom Enders, initiated the largest position in United Financial Bancorp Inc (NASDAQ:UBNK). Paul Hondros’s AlphaOne Capital Partners also made a $1.1 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The only other fund with a new position in the stock is Peter Rathjens, Bruce Clarke and John Campbell’s Arrowstreet Capital.

Let’s go over hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to United Financial Bancorp Inc (NASDAQ:UBNK). We will take a look at Penntex Midstream Partners LP (NASDAQ:PTXP), InvenSense Inc (NYSE:INVN), Global Eagle Acquisition Corp (NASDAQ:ENT), and Costamare Inc (NYSE:CMRE). All of these stocks’ market caps match UBNK’s market cap.

Ticker No of HFs with positions Total Value of HF Positions (x1000) Change in HF Position
PTXP 4 54104 0
INVN 15 23195 1
ENT 11 308827 -2
CMRE 11 22129 4

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 $102 million. That figure was $31 million in UBNK’s case. InvenSense Inc (NYSE:INVN) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Penntex Midstream Partners LP (NASDAQ:PTXP) is the least popular one with only 4 bullish hedge fund positions. United Financial Bancorp Inc (NASDAQ:UBNK) 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 INVN might be a better candidate to consider taking a long position in.

Disclosure: none.

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