Blackstone remains the most overweight U.S. stock among major funds, but the size of that position is apparently shrinking. Meanwhile Amazon has seen the biggest increase in position, reports Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
Amazon saw the biggest change in position, Blackstone exposure reduced
Strategist Nigel Tupper and team released the latest edition of their “Large investors’ large positions report” on Wednesday. They looked at $11 trillion in funds under management and found that Blackstone is still the most overweight U.S. stock. In Europe, it’s Paddy Power, while HDFC is Asia’s most overweight stock and Disco Corp is Japan’s biggest position.
Blackstone’s position as the most overweight stock in the U.S. hasn’t changed, and in second place is NXP Semiconductor. However, large investors are starting to reduce their exposure to both of these stocks. The stock with the biggest change in position over the last three months has been Amazon, report BAML strategists. This isn’t surprising as the online retailer’s stock was on a tear and among the most favorite hedge fund positions as part of FANG (Facebook, Amazon, Netflix, Google).
Large investors also upped their exposure to Chubb, which saw the second biggest change in exposure following Amazon. Here’s a look at the major stock positions from the last three months among U.S.-listed companies:
The only sector U.S. investors are overweight on is Consumer Discretionary, while the two most underweight sectors are Financials and Consumer Staples.
Major positions outside the U.S.
In Europe, major investors are most underweight on Nestle and HSBC, and they added to their exposures to Alcatel-Lucent and Barclays well selling Novartis and Roche.
In Japan, large investors bought FANUC and Japan Airlines the most but sold KDDI and Nintendo.
In Asia, investors bought Tencent and China Mobile, reducing their underweight positioning in both stocks.
Globally, HDFC Bank is the most overweight position, while Blackstone falls lower on the list although it still makes it on there. Microsoft and ExxonMobil both made it onto the global underweight list, according to BAML.
Looking at sectors, investors are significantly overweight on Consumer Discretionary in all areas except Japan. They’re also overweight Technology, except in the U.S. Unsurprisingly, Financials and Energy the most underweight positions globally.
Here’s a nice map summary BAML put together to illustrate the top global positions:
Note: In order to make it onto BAML’s list, the stocks had to be held by at least 50 funds, have an average active weight of more than 15 basis points, and an average daily turnover of more than $5 million or $10 million for the U.S. and Europe. They also had to have a total dollar value of their aggregate active weight of more than $500 million.
