Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (WWW): Hedge Funds Aren’t Crazy About It, Insider Sentiment Unchanged

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Is it smart to be bullish on Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW)?

To many market players, hedge funds are assumed to be overrated, old financial vehicles of a period lost to current times. Although there are In excess of 8,000 hedge funds with their doors open in present day, this site looks at the crème de la crème of this group, about 525 funds. Analysts calculate that this group oversees the majority of the hedge fund industry’s total capital, and by tracking their best equity investments, we’ve deciphered a number of investment strategies that have historically outpaced the broader indices. Our small-cap hedge fund strategy outperformed the S&P 500 index by 18 percentage points per annum for a decade in our back tests, and since we’ve started sharing our picks with our subscribers at the end of August 2012, we have outpaced the S&P 500 index by 33 percentage points in 11 months (see all of our picks from August).

Just as necessary, bullish insider trading sentiment is a second way to look at the stock market universe. Obviously, there are many reasons for an insider to get rid of shares of his or her company, but just one, very simple reason why they would buy. Various academic studies have demonstrated the impressive potential of this tactic if investors know where to look (learn more here).

Thus, let’s discuss the newest info about Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW).

What does the smart money think about Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW)?

At the end of the second quarter, a total of 7 of the hedge funds we track were long in this stock, a change of -13% from the first quarter. With hedgies’ sentiment swirling, there exists a select group of notable hedge fund managers who were boosting their stakes considerably.

Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW)According to our 13F database, Robert Joseph Caruso’s Select Equity Group had the most valuable position in Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW), worth close to $229.7 million, accounting for 3.2% of its total 13F portfolio. The second largest stake is held by Royce & Associates, managed by Chuck Royce, which held a $51.1 million position; 0.2% of its 13F portfolio is allocated to the stock. Some other hedge funds with similar optimism include Mario Gabelli’s GAMCO Investors, and Cliff Asness’s AQR Capital Management.

As Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW) has experienced dropping sentiment from the entirety of the hedge funds we track, we can see that there were a few money managers who sold off their full holdings in Q1. At the top of the heap, Alexander Mitchell’s Scopus Asset Management dropped the largest position of the “upper crust” of funds we monitor, comprising about $8 million in stock, and Jim Simons of Renaissance Technologies was right behind this move, as the fund sold off about $0.9 million worth. These moves are important to note, as total hedge fund interest fell by 1 funds in Q1.

Insider trading activity in Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW)

Insider buying made by high-level executives is at its handiest when the company we’re looking at has seen transactions within the past six months. Over the last six-month time frame, Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW) has seen zero unique insiders buying, and zero insider sales (see the details of insider trades here).

We’ll check out the relationship between both of these indicators in other stocks similar to Wolverine World Wide, Inc. (NYSE:WWW). These stocks are Crocs, Inc. (NASDAQ:CROX), Tumi Holdings Inc (NYSE:TUMI), Iconix Brand Group Inc (NASDAQ:ICON), Steven Madden, Ltd. (NASDAQ:SHOO), and Deckers Outdoor Corp (NASDAQ:DECK). This group of stocks belong to the textile – apparel footwear & accessories industry and their market caps are closest to WWW’s market cap.

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