Published on 10 Nov 2021 on Insider Monkey via Yahoo Finance

Was The Smart Money Right About Mattel, Inc. (MAT)?

Many prominent investors, including Warren Buffett, David Tepper and Stan Druckenmiller, have been cautious regarding the current bull market and missed out as the stock market reached another high in recent weeks. On the other hand, technology hedge funds weren't timid and registered double digit market beating gains. Financials, energy and industrial stocks initially suffered the most but many of these stocks delivered strong returns since November and hedge funds actually increased their positions in these stocks. In this article we will find out how hedge fund sentiment towards Mattel, Inc. (NASDAQ:MAT) changed recently.

Hedge fund interest in Mattel, Inc. (NASDAQ:MAT) shares was flat at the end of last quarter. This is usually a negative indicator. Our calculations also showed that MAT isn't among the 30 most popular stocks among hedge funds (click for Q2 rankings). The level and the change in hedge fund popularity aren't the only variables you need to analyze to decipher hedge funds' perspectives. A stock may witness a boost in popularity but it may still be less popular than similarly priced stocks. That's why at the end of this article we will examine companies such as First Financial Bankshares Inc (NASDAQ:FFIN), Cabot Oil & Gas Corporation (NYSE:COG), and Envista Holdings Corporation (NYSE:NVST) to gather more data points.

Why do we pay any attention at all to hedge fund sentiment? Our research has shown that a select group of hedge fund holdings outperformed the S&P 500 ETFs by 79 percentage points since March 2017 (see the details here). That's why we believe hedge fund sentiment is an extremely useful indicator that investors should pay attention to.