Top Hedgies Leaving Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) Even With $700-$750 PT
Top hedge fund managers are now abandoning their shares of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) with the majority shifting investments to Microsoft.
Compiling data from hedge fund tracking web site Insider Monkey, TechInsider saw that major hedge fund managers had dumped their shares of the stock. With this, Apple Inc is no longer one of the top 5 most favourite stocks among big-wig hedgies.
According to the data, Apple still had bullish positions coming from 160 hedge funds with a total of $18.5 billion bets at the end of December 2013. But this figure dropped by the end of March to only 129 bullish positions with $14.9 billion bets.
Some hedge funds initiated put positions for the stock, playing it safely if Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) shares decline.
Hedge Funds at Caxton Associates, Balyasny Asset Management, Blue Mountain Capital, Pentwater Capital, AlphaBet Management, Sabby Capital, and Laurion Capital are betting on Apple shares decline that they believe will happen soon.
Five hedge funds had totally abandoned their positions on Apple - Dan Loeb of Third Point, Rob Citrone of DiscoveryCapital, Robert Pitts of Steadfast Capital, John Armitage of Egerton and Howard Guberman of Gruss Asset Management.
Hedgies Mike Masters, with almost $400 million, and John Wu, with $168 million, call options on December dropped also.
On the other hand, Quant hedge fund Renaissance Capital started a $440 million position on Apple stock that was seen gaining profit over the months of April.
Bill Miller, the current chairman and CIO of LLM and former chairman and chief investment officer of Legg Mason, predicts that Apple will be worth $700 - $750 soon. He said with the stock reaching new high at $600 again from October 2012, Apple's run isn't over yet.
"It is not as attractive as it once was, but I still think it's worth $700, $750," he said during an interview with CNBC's Closing Bell on Tuesday.
He also said that he remains bullish on Apple's market.
"The bears hate the market because it won't go down and the bulls hate it because it won't go up. But it's a great market, I think, for people who actually want to invest who have a time horizon longer than the next 30 minutes to 3 weeks," Miller said.