What Does Smart Money Think about Avery Dennison Corp (AVY)?

As aggregate interest increased, key hedge funds have been driving this bullishness. Winton Capital Management, managed by David Harding, assembled the biggest position in Avery Dennison Corp (NYSE:AVY). Winton Capital Management had $9.6 million invested in the company at the end of the quarter. Robert B. Gillam’s McKinley Capital Management also made a $5.2 million investment in the stock during the quarter. The other funds with brand new AVY positions are Joel Greenblatt’s Gotham Asset Management, Steve Cohen’s Point72 Asset Management, and George Hall’s Clinton Group.

Let’s now review hedge fund activity in other stocks similar to Avery Dennison Corp (NYSE:AVY). We will take a look at Shire PLC (ADR) (NASDAQ:SHPG), Signature Bank (NASDAQ:SBNY), Allegion PLC (NYSE:ALLE), and Mallinckrodt PLC (NYSE:MNK). This group of stocks’ market valuations match AVY’s market valuation.

As you can see these stocks had an average of 37 funds with long positions and the average amount invested in these stocks was $1.59 billion. That figure was $404 million in AVY’s case. Shire PLC (ADR) (NASDAQ:SHPG) is the most popular stock in this table. On the other hand Signature Bank (NASDAQ:SBNY) is the least popular one with only 29 bullish hedge fund positions. Avery Dennison Corp (NYSE:AVY) 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, Shire PLC (ADR) (NASDAQ:SHPG) might be a better candidate to consider a long position.