25 Most Popular Stocks for Hedge Funds in Q2

WalletHub released Thursday an analysis of the most popular stocks that hedge funds bought and sold in the second quarter.

WalletHub based its report on quarterly public disclosures from more than 400 hedge funds to find their biggest holdings, new positions and recent exits.

(Related: Hedge Funds Extend Performance Streak in July)

Judging from hedge funds’ most bought stocks, it looks like technology is a hot sector for investors. Amazon, Oracle, Netflix and both the A and the C share classes for Google were in the top 10. Amgen, a biotech company, was the eighth most-bought stock in hedge funds.

One tech stock that lost favor last quarter was Apple, which was the second most sold stock.

Hedge funds are also unloading stocks in the health care and food sectors. Hedge fund investors let go of Eli Lilly; Merck; Medtronic, a medical device company; and Pfizer. Kellogg was hedge funds’ most-sold stock in the second quarter, while PepsiCo was also in the top 10. JPMorgan and Johnson & Johnson were also on the list.

Interestingly, Google’s A class shares were on both the most-bought and most-sold lists.

“Given the fact that Alphabet owns the world’s two most popular sites, Google and YouTube, it really came as no surprise that it’s widely popular on the stock market,” WalletHub analyst Jill Gonzalez told ThinkAdvisor by email. “Because of this, the overall business remains in good shape. Stocks hit all-time highs this summer, and have risen more than 30% over the past year.”

Gonzalez pointed to Alphabet’s strong financial foundation, along with continued double-digit earnings and sales.

“As of now, the company has more than $90 billion in cash and short-term investments, and generates about $7 billion in free cash flow every quarter,” she said. “That being said, Google was part of the biggest antitrust suit ever this year, which scared off some investors. Given this and its strong numbers, it’s on both the most-sold and most-bought lists.”

Despite the recent interest in technology, hedge fund managers allocated most of their investments to financials, with more than a quarter of their portfolios in that sector. More than 19% of their investments were allocated to tech stocks, followed by over 15% in services.

Here are the 25 most popular hedge fund stocks for the second quarter of 2017:

25. Occidental Petroleum Corp. (OXY)

24. U.S. Bancorp (USB)

23. American Express Co. (AXP)

22. Eversource Energy (ES)

21. Costco Wholesale Corp. (COST)

20. Bristol-Myers Squibb Co. (BMY)