The third quarter filings season finished the last week so we put together another review of activist investor trends. To remain consistent, we used the same list of managers as last quarter but this type of analysis could be applied to any group of managers by using our trend analysis tool. As one of our subscribers rightly mentioned, the analysis in this document is based only on managers 13F equity filings data.
13F – Notable Stocks
FedEx Corporation (NYSE:FDX) – Third Point increased their holding significantly
Morgans Hotel Group Co. (NASDAQ:MHGC) – Centaurus Capital increased their holding significantly
TIM Participacoes SA (ADR) (NYSE:TSU), CTC Media, Inc. (NASDAQ:CTCM) – Centaurus Capital initiated large new positions
Vail Resorts, Inc. (NYSE:MTN) – Marcato Capital Management initiated a large new position
Air Products & Chemicals, Inc. (NYSE:APD) – Pershing Square Capital doubled their holding
Safeway Inc. (NYSE:SWY) – Two new holders, Sandell Asset Management and Cibelli Mario, along with previous Jana Partners holding
Marvell Technology Group Ltd. (NASDAQ:MRVL) – Seneca Capital near full redemption
Motorola Solutions Inc (NYSE:MSI) – Icahn Partners and Valueact Holdings fully redeemed
Bally Technologies Inc. (NYSE:BYI) – P2 Capital Partners significant redemption
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) – Two out of five holders fully redeemed
Citigroup Inc (NYSE:C) – Two of three holders fully redeemed
Office Depot Inc (NYSE:ODP) – Two of three holders fully redeemed, one large position remaining for Starboard Value Partners
Spectrum Brands Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:SPB) – Fully redeemed by Harbinger Holdings
Capitalization and Sector
During the quarter there was a clear rotation out of large cap stocks and into small caps. Managers increased their concentration in Micro and Small cap stocks as can be seen by the higher average weight and lower position count (we ignore Nano stocks since there’s only 1 holding). At the same time, the average weight of manager positions in Mega, Large, and Mid cap stocks were all lower.
The average position size of managers holdings in Retail, Financial, Conglomerate, and Media stocks decreased over the quarter. In particular, activist holdings in financial companies were reduced significantly as can be seen by the drop in total positions held from 58 to 40 along with the decrease in average weight by 0.83%.
See full article here.
