Why These Five Stocks Are on the Move Today?

It’s been a rather quiet Friday on Wall Street as the NASDAQ has inched up, while the S&P 500 and Dow Jones are slightly in the red. Among the stocks with more volatility than most on Friday are Party City Holdco Inc (NYSE:PRTY), A. M. Castle & Co (NYSE:CAS), Yirendai Ltd – ADR (NYSE:YRD), GigPeak Inc (NYSEMKT:GIG), and Macy’s, Inc. (NYSE:M). In this article, let’s analyze why each stock is moving and see how the smart money is positioned in each stock.

While there are many metrics that investors can assess in the investment process, the hedge fund sentiment is something that is often overlooked. However, hedge funds and other institutional investors allocate significant resources while making their bets and their long-term focus makes them the perfect investors to emulate. This is supported by our research, which determined that following the small-cap stocks that hedge funds are collectively bullish on can help a smaller investor to beat the S&P 500 by around 95 basis points per month (see the details here).

Party City Holdco Continues its Slide

Party City Holdco Inc (NYSE:PRTY) is 3% in the red as investors continue to digest the company’s mixed first-quarter earnings report released yesterday. Although Party City beat earnings expectations by $0.01 per share, its revenue grew slower than expected. If Party City sales continue to underperform, the company might have a difficult time meeting its full year EPS guidance of $1.17 to $1.25. Eight funds from our database owned $40.04 million of Party City Holdco Inc (NYSE:PRTY) at the end of December.

Microcap Stock Slides After Boost

Momentum trading is alive and well as shares of microcap A. M. Castle & Co (NYSE:CAS) have retreated by 44% today after the stock surged by 58% from Monday to Thursday. The microcap stock surged on Tuesday because it announced that it had completed the sale of TPI for $55.1 million in cash and had sold the vast majority of energy-related inventory for net sales of $27.1 million. Despite the sale, the company remains heavily indebted. A. M. Castle & Co (NYSE:CAS)’s net debt-to-capital ratio was 92.3% at the end of March. The debt load could be the reason for today’s fall. 8 elite funds owned $18.96 million of A. M. Castle & Co (NYSE:CAS) at the end of 2015.

On the next page, we examine the latest news surrounding Yirendai, GigPeak, and Macy’s.