Bill Ackman, in his most recent quarterly letter to his investors, just divulged a secret we have been telling our subscribers for almost three years now: If you want to get rich, piggybacking the trades of the world’s best billionaire investors and hedge funds could help you attain this goal.
Ackman stated the following in his most recent quarterly letter to his investors: “In 26 out of 30 of our activist commitments, the day-after price was still a bargain versus the ultimate price achieved from our involvement with the company.”
This means if you bought every stock Bill Ackman bought the day after it was announced, you would have made money on 26 out of 30 stocks (87%). More important, you would have made 21 times your money. That turns $100,000 into $2.1 million, or $50,000 into more than $1 million.
Over the past week, I received hundreds of emails concerning Carl Icahn’s announcement that he took an 8% position in Hertz (HTZ). We know Icahn has already publicly stated he wants to actively engage with Hertz management and its CEO, but there has been no word about Icahn pushing Hertz to merge or sell itself.
Here is why: First, regulators would never approve a Hertz-Avis merger. The two entities represent too large a share of the industry. It would essentially be a monopoly. So a merger with Avis isn’t happening — at least in my opinion.
Though, given the quick 25% run up in Family Dollar (FDO) last month after Icahn forced a merger with Dollar Tree (DLTR), it’s easy to see why investors are hoping for a similar result. Clearly, people don’t want to miss out on the next FDO. On that note, you can read some great analysis of the Family Dollar deal, where my partner and I predicted the merger and picked the bottom in Family Dollar stock (read that here).
But again, this is not going to happen with Hertz. Icahn and numerous other investors are long Hertz. Hertz is actually one of the most popular stocks owned by top billionaire hedge fund managers, because it’s a pure play on the improving economy, and rental car companies have lagged airlines in terms of raising their prices.
So many hedge funds are betting on Hertz increasing its prices, like the airlines did last year, and they are betting that demand will continue to improve with the recovery in the economy. It’s that simple.
Also, this is not a classic Icahn play. He typically comes into a deeply depressed stock selling near its 52-week low or multi-year lows. Icahn purchased Hertz near the stock’s all-time high.
But what Icahn is doing is playing his “change” card. He has recently laid out his evidence, based on his history as an activist investor, of how replacing a CEO is a powerful catalyst for producing shareholder wealth creation. And one of his fellow shareholders in Hertz is already at work on that strategy: Fir Tree Partners is pressuring the board to oust the CEO.
If you are managing more than $100 million, you are required to report to your holdings to the SEC within 45 days of the end of the quarter. And tonight we began to see those disclosures hit, for a peek into the activities of the world’s best billionaire hedge fund managers.
Now, 13-F filings provide a ton of information, but you have to know exactly what to look for to make them useful.
With that being said, here is what caught my eye tonight from the quarterly holdings of the world’s best billionaire hedge fund managers.
Apple ($AAPL)
Every top hedge fund seemed to either buy or increase their position in Apple (AAPL), including billionaire Leon Cooperman. Cooperman initiated a brand new position in the stock, buying more than 1 million shares in Apple last quarter (before it split). We said almost two months ago on this blog that Apple’s 7-for-1 stock split in June would be a positive catalyst to push the stock higher. In an instant, it would make the most widely held stock in the world affordable again for the retail investor. Apple is up almost 25% over since announcing the split, and is currently trading near a significant psychological round number of $100.
Expect a big fuss to be made about the activity in Apple shown in these filings, but this one looks old and tired. Apple was a good buy after its June stock split and was an even better buy when I called the bottom in the stock more than a year ago (see it here). And that was well before Carl Icahn or any major hedge fund owned the stock. Bottom line, I would not buy Apple here and would actually sell it when it hits $100.
Facebook ($FB)
The world’s best-performing hedge fund manager, David Tepper, added to his position in Facebook, but again Facebook had a nice run last quarter and is now up more than 40%. So piggybacking Tepper on Facebbook (which usually is a can’t-miss trade) today is again a stale trade. I don’t like it.
Zynga ($ZNGA)
Now here is a trade that could be compelling. Patrick McCormack, a Tiger Cub and head of Tiger Consumer Management, initiated a new position in Zynga last quarter at prices much higher than what Zynga is selling for today. By my estimates, Tiger Consumer purchased its new 18 million share stake in Zynga at $4, or 28% above its current price.
After selling off after a bad earnings report, the stock looks like it has found support and a double bottom at the $2.85 area. So Zynga could be a good trade to piggyback from Tiger Consumer.
Warren Buffett and Verizon ($VZ)
Buffett sold his entire position in Starz ($STRZA) and Conoco Phillips ($COP), and initiated a new $365 million position in Charter Comunications (CHTR).
Plus, as we predicted in February in our Forbes piece, he increased his position in Verizon. He now owns more than $700 million dollars worth of Verizon Stock ($VZ) after adding an additional 4 million shares.
The fact that Buffett increased an already huge stake in Verizon, and the stock has been flat over the past four months, makes VZ a very compelling trade to piggyback.
Billionaire Hedge Fund Manager John Paulson, Gold and Biotech
John Paulson initiated and added to positions that were heavily weighted in the biotech and healthcare sectors. Paulson initiated new positions in Allergan ($AGN) and Questcor Pharmaceuticals ($QCOR). And he added to his stake in Vanda Pharmaceuticals (a stock we owned almost two years ago in our Billionaire’s Portfolio service, at $4.50).
As for his gold position, no change. But he doubled his position in Dollar General (DG), and this could be the trade to piggyback. The stock has traded flat over the past four months, it’s rumored to be a merger or takeover candidate, and we have a big influential investor that has upped his stake, dramatically. That’s a good formula for success.
Tiger Global, Viking Global and Netflix ($NFLX)
Tiger Global initiated a nearly $200 million dollar position in Netflix (NFLX), a savvy move given Netflix is up almost 40% over the past four months. Billionaire Andreas Halvorsen of Viking Global also initiated a new position in Netflix, buying almost $600 million worth of the stock last quarter.
Billionaire Dan Loeb of Third Point
Billionaire Dan Loeb of Third point purchased new positions in Rackspace (RAX), IAC/Interactive Corp (IACI), and Ally Financial (ALLY). Third Point owns almost 10% of Ally, which recently started trading in April as a spinoff. Of all these new positions to piggyback, I like Rackspace (RAX) the best. Rackspace is down almost 20% year-to-date and has been rumored to be a takeover candidate.
Bill Ackman and Pershing Square
Ackman trimmed most of his real estate holdings, including Home Properties ($HME) and Apartment Investment and Manangement ($AIV), perhaps signaling that he believes REITs and real estate stocks have topped out. Ackman also increased his already large stake in Allergan ($AGN), showing that many of the top billionaire hedge fund managers are still very bullish on healthcare-biotech stocks, as well as M&A. John Paulson also took a large position in Allergan (AGN), a healthcare stock that is in the process of being acquired.
Billionaire Seth Klarman of Baupost Group
Seth Klarman is probably one of the worst hedge fund managers to piggyback. He prefers to hold a significant amount of cash and prefers illiquid, private investments to pubic ones. Klarman did purchase a new stake in EBAY (EBAY) and Theravanace Biopharma (TBPH), a stock that recently went public and is up more than 30% over the past three months. Klarman sold his entire stake in BP Plc (BP).
Here are the takeaways from the Q2 filings of the world’s best billionaire hedge funds: First, the best hedge fund managers are still bullish on technology, healthcare and biotech stocks, but are turning bearish on energy stocks.
The top billionaire hedge funds took advantage of the mini crash in technology stocks during the second quarter to add to or initiate positions in some of the best names in technology: Apple, Facebook and Netflix. This bet paid off huge for many of these managers, as all three of these stocks greatly outperformed the S&P 500 over the past few months.
Lastly, many of these investors own the same stocks, the most popular being Family Dollar, Dollar General, EBAY and Apple.
Fact #1: Carl Icahn has returned 27% annualized over the past 52 years.
Fact #2: Academic studies from Harvard, Duke and NYU have shown that activist investors like Carl Icahn have produced an excess annualized return of 20% on average (i.e., the return above the S&P 500). So these studies show activists doing 30% relative to 10% in the S&P (during the period analyzed).
With that, when you see a top activist like Carl Icahn down on a stock, and the stock is underperforming the S&P 500, it presents a very intriguing opportunity — perhaps even a time to back up the truck.
This is the core strategy we implement in our Billionaire’s Portfolio service. We want stocks owned by the world best billionaire activist investors — particularly when they are down on them, and these stocks present an asymmetric risk/reward (little downside, a lot of upside opportunity).
Icahn is down more than 20% on his 6% stake in Transocean, as his average cost for Transocean is around $50. Transocean is down 19% year-to-date and is underperforming the S&P 500 by 26%.
Based on Icahn’s track record and the academic studies on the performance of activism, if Transocean fell in line with that history, we could see at least a 45% move for RIG, and that is assuming the S&P 500 returns zero.
Even better, you get to buy Transocean at a cheaper price than what Carl Icahn paid, and the stock has just formed a double bottom. You could pick the bottom in this stock.
Transocean recently reported better than expected earnings, but the stock has been weak due to a correction in oil prices — a move that is bucking the trend of rising geopolitical tensions (for the moment). Transocean has also recently declared its dividend, which always causes a high-yielding stock to temporarily sell off.
For a higher-risk way to play it, buying the Feb 2015 $40 call options for $2 could net you as much as a 600% return if Transocean goes up 45% by the end of February 2015. That’s $1,200 for every $200.
Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio
A new ETF was launched today that has a very similar name to our website and research.
Of course we at Billionairesportfolio.com like the strategy of following the smart money (the world’s best billionaire hedge funds and managers). In fact, we developed this process back in 2003 through our research at one of the top independent research firms.
The problem we have with the iBillionaire ETF is that the founder, Raul Moreno, isn’t a market professional but instead is a serial entrepreneur: tech today, finance tomorrow. With that, I am highly skeptical of his ability to construct a study with integrity and robustness that would lead to his claims. What are those claims? He claims on CNBC yesterday were that his “index” has outperformed the S&P 500 by 500 basis points (annualized) over the past eight years. To my knowledge, he created this index recently and cannot possibly claim a “return” over an eight-year history. Unless it’s an auditable return within the context of a money-management program, the performance claims attached to this ETF should be taken with a grain of salt (i.e., beware).
Yet I would be most concerned with the following:
1) iBillionaire includes George Soros in their index. This is ludicrous. Soros has been retired for over 10 years. His family office, managed by his son, is highly complicated, with assets spread across a variety of markets and themes. To piggyback his stock picks is of little value.
2) iBillionaire includes Richard Chilton in their index. Chilton is a relatively unknown “seed manager” who allocates money to hedge fund managers; the performance of his funds are average at best, and they own hundreds of stocks.
3) iBillionaire includes Bruce Berkowitz, the ex-stock broker who runs a mutual fund out of sunny Miami. Berkowitz imploded in 2011, underperforming the S&P 500 by a whopping 34 percentage points. We’re not sure he’s a guy you want to follow either. Berkowitz is not a billionaire. Though if you like Berkowitz and his investing style so much, you can simply buy his mutual fund, which has almost the same expense ratio as the iBillionaire ETF.
4) iBillionaire is basically an S&P 500 index clone. It holds only large-cap S&P 500 stocks, such as Apple, IBM and Coke — stocks that pretty much everyone already has in their retirement portfolio. So there is a very good chance you probably already own these stocks in your retirement portfolio or 401K, and you would just be duplicating your holdings by purchasing this ETF.
5) Also, according to my statistics, the iBillionaire Index has almost a 95% percent correlation to the S&P 500, so, again, you are basically getting the same exposure as owning the S&P 500 ETF ($SPY), except $SPY is 75% cheaper.
6) Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, the iBillionaire ETF has no track record, nor does its manager. At best, the numbers they promote are just a hypothetical backtested return with very little statistics given to validate it. At worst, those numbers could be completely made up, given there is no regulatory and auditing scrutiny given to the attributes of a newly created index.
In conclusion, the iBillionaire ETF looks like a passive way to get exposure to the biggest stocks in the S&P 500, with the wrapper of a hot, sexy concept (billionaires).
Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio (the first ever documented service that piggybacked the world’s best billionaire hedge funds and managers).
Billionairesportfolio.com
Trulia jumped 35% today and is up more than 50% over the last 2 months on rumors that the two top online real estate websites, Zillow and Trulia are going to merge.
You won’t find merger situations like this looking at charts, fundamentals or research reports. The best way you to predict which stocks will be acquired is by following the smart money, the world’s best billionaire investors and hedge funds.
Billionaire Chase Coleman and his Tiger Global Fund, probably the best technology stock picking hedge fund on the planet, owned almost 5% of Trulia. You could have piggybacked Tiger Global and purchased Trulia for $27 a share this year. That would have given you a double in less than five months.
At BillionairesPortfolio.com not only do we track every stock pick of the worlds best billionaire investors and hedge funds, but we only recommend them when they are selling at the same price or less than what the billionaire investor or hedge fund paid.
We have 20 stocks in our Billionaires Portfolio all owned by the worlds best billionaire hedge fund managers, all of which could be acquired for a 50% to 100% premium on any given day. To get a list of these stocks in our portfolio just click here.
Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio
You will never beat the stock market, unless you listen to this.
Even with more than 15 years of hedge fund experience, and a decent education, I would never invest a dollar unless I knew for sure that one of the top billionaire investors or hedge funds owned the stock. It’s just that simple.
I’m sorry to break it to you, but you can’t beat the market trading on news, or your stock broker’s latest tips, or following the latest musings on CNBC. It’s a good way to lose a lot of money, though.
There are only about 35 truly great investors in the world, ones that have consistently outperformed the market over the past 10-15 years. Some of these names you may recognize, like Carl Icahn, David Tepper, Dan Loeb and Warren Buffett.
So why make investing so difficult? Just simply invest with the best!
That’s what I do. I don’t own a mutual fund or listen to a financial advisor. I just buy what Icahn, Loeb or Buffett buys.
And I go one step further. Since I have actually traded for a multi-billion dollar hedge fund, and I know how hard it is to buy a big position in a stock, and how long it takes, I know the world’s best investors are patient and accumulate stocks on corrections and dips. That means, many times, I have a chance to pay the same price or better than what these billionaire investors and hedge funds paid. I call it, “buying a billionaire on a dip.”
It just makes sense, doesn’t it?
For example, let’s say I know one of the top billion-dollar activist hedge funds, which has averaged 30% a year over the past 15 years, owns 10% of a stock and is down on that stock. And I know this particular fund’s average holding period is two years. Why wouldn’t I want to own that stock?
It’s simple. It’s a statistical bet that puts the odds in my favor. And that is the formula for making money over time. Plus it lets me sleep at night knowing a big, influential investor is working relentlessly on my behalf to create value.
So I don’t throw darts. I don’t try to predict the future. I just bet alongside those that have a lot of money on the line, the power and influence, and a record of making a lot of money.
At BillionairesPortfolio.com, all we do is track the 30 to 40 best billionaire stock pickers, activists and hedge funds. And we look to get involved in stocks where we can pay the same price or less than they pay. Pretty simple, right?
Our stock picks gained 34% in 2013. And my studies of “buying the best billionaire investors on a dip” have shown this strategy would have made 31% over the past 12 years. That compares to a 6% return in the S&P 500.
Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio
Billionairesportfolio.com
Online Real Estate broker, ZipRealty, was acquired for a 122% premium today by Realogy, a real estate brokerage conglomerate. ZipRealty happens to be owned by two of the top small cap activist hedge funds in the world, Osmium Partners and Cannell Capital.
These two hedge funds own a combined 30% of Zip Realty and have been pushing for a change, including the option of a sale. With that, it was no surprise to us at Billionairesportfolio.com to see $ZIPR acquired for more than a 100% premium in one day.
In our premium research service, The Billionaires Portfolio, we own a stock in our portfolio that is controlled by the same small cap activist hedge fund Osmium Partners — the same investor that helped influence a 120% premium in ZipRealty.
Osmium owns almost 15% of the stock in our Billionaire’s Portfolio and in this case too, they are pushing for a sale of the company. We think this stock could be another Ziprealty, with the potential for a big take-out premium.
Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio
1) Mike Novogratz from Fortress is still bullish on Japan (and so are we at Billionairesportfolio.com) and Argentina, says that Argentinian stocks and currencies are a good bet because the current president is leaving.
2) Billionaire Leon Cooperman had 9 of his 10 stocks show a profit from last year’s conference so here are some of his picks: SandRidge (which we own in The Billionaires Portfolio)
3) Billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller goes for the throat in his criticism of the Fed’s low interest rates.
“I don’t know what it is in their forecasting record that gives them the confidence,” he says to a low gasp and some chuckles. (this is from a guy who dropped out of grad school in Economics at Michigan after one semester!)
4) Accel Partners’ Jim Breyer thinks three Internet companies could be trillion dollar companies in the next 10years: Google, Alibaba or Tencent. Mr. Breyer said he’d buy Alibaba for the right valuation.
Breyer sees a tale of two types of companies landscape right now. Start up/early seed valuations, he said, are very frothy but some will have huge takeouts by the big Internet companies like Google. Others in the consumer Internet space will just die if the big tech firms don’t want them. (exactly why I have been saying the best fund hedge to start today is a long short internet fund
5) Governor Christie tells you to short Tesla, $TSLA. Basically Tesla is in violation of New Jersey Automobile laws and they can no longer sell cars in the state.
6) Billionaire Hedge Fund Manager John Paulson and Larry Robbins both see M&A picking up, especially in energy and media. Paulson like Oasis Petroleum $OAS
7) Paulson is still bullish on the housing market. (He owns Realogy (RLGY) which I think is the best pure play on the residential housing market)
Peltz defends Activist Investing “He says that activists are helping companies and that he doesn’t agree with arguments they are too short-term. He says activists fix what’s wrong and work for all shareholders, even if they sell out” (which is exactly what we do at Billionairesportfolio.com coinvest and piggyback activist investors)
9) Lastly both Bill Ackman and Nelson Peltz agree that Carl Icahn is the world’s greatest investor, even better than Buffett(we have been saying this for years at Billionairesportfolio.com)
Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio
Everyone knows Carl Icahn is the world’s greatest investor, he has averaged 27% annualized returns for over 52 years, the greatest track record in the history of investing.
Icahn initiated a 6% activist position in Talisman Energy (TLM) last fall at an average price of $11.66. Today you can coinvest with Carl Icahn in Talisman at a 15% discount to what he paid for his 6% stake, as the stock is selling near support at $10 a share.
Talisman is an undervalued oil and gas producer that sports nearly a 3% dividend yield. Icahn has stated that he plans to have discussions with the management and the board of the company, about strategic alternatives including selling all or parts of the company.
By paying the same price or less for Talisman, you are getting to ride Carl Icahn’s Activism for free, and better yet you have a 15% margin of safety, as Talisman is currently selling at a price 15% below to what Icahn paid for his stake.
Coinvesting with the worlds greatest billionaire investors and hedge funds (like a Carl Icahn) is what we do at Billionairesportfolio.com. We are the first and only website that empowers the everyday investor to coinvest with world’s greatest billionaire investors and hedge funds.
When you pay the same price or less for the same stock that the billionaire investor or hedge fund paid, and sell when we find the big investors has sold, you can capture almost 98% of the actual gross returns of these top hedge fund managers and investors. And you can do this yourself, in your own TD Ameritrade, Schwab, Etrade account, etc. You can follow our lead and the lead of billionaire investors without the $5 million minimum and 2% and 20% fee structure normally required to invest directly with one of these top hedge funds.
Furthermore when you sign up for The Billionaires Portfolio you will get our handpicked portfolio of small cap and deep value stock picks owned by the world’s best billionaire investors and hedge funds, all of which could double or triple by the end of the year.
You will also receive weekly updates and analysis on the stock market and the economy mailed to your inbox from a top hedge fund trader and economist with over 30 years combined experience in the hedge fund industry.
Will Meade
President of The Billionaires Portfolio
