Hedge funds see treasure in new public players

Hedge fund managers bought shares of several of last year's hot IPOs in the fourth quarter, including upscale retailer Michael Kors and online networking site LinkedIn. Another company with an initial public offering that was a hedge fund favourite was online coupon company Groupon. But the company's stock has performed poorly since its November debut.
The hedge fund holdings were disclosed Tuesday in quarterly 13F filings with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Philippe Laffont's Coatue Management LLC bought up 680,000 shares of LinkedIn Corp, worth $42.6 million, and 50,000 shares of online coupon purveyor Groupon Inc that are roughly valued at $1 million, according to the firm's regulatory filing.
Laffont's bet on LinkedIn looks to be paying off. The company went public in May at $45 per share and soared to $94.25 by the end of its first day. Linkedin was trading at $85.10 at the close of trade on Tuesday. But Groupon, which went public in November at $20 a share and peaked around $26, has struggled since. It shares closed at $19.35 on the Nasdaq.
New York-based hedge fund Contour Asset Management upped its stake in LinkedIn in the fourth quarter to 565,000 shares from 275,000. Diamondback Capital Management also bought over 45,000 LinkedIn shares in the same period. Chicago-based Alyeska Investment Group, which focuses on IPOs, added 100,000 shares of LinkedIn to its portfolio in the fourth quarter. The hedge fund also added 100,l00 shares online of real estate company Zillow Inc, about 200,000 shares of online travel services company Homeaway Inc, and 112,000 shares of Angie's List Inc, an online consumer company. All of those online companies went public in 2011 with much fanfare. John Thaler's JAT Capital, one of the last year's top performing firms, also scooped up shares of Groupon in the fourth quarter.
But Thaler did better with his fund's move into shares of Michael Kors, which went public in December. The retailer's stock has rallied by about 40 percent since its launch. JAT Capital bought about 865,000 thousand shares of Michael Kors. Other hedge funds that loaded up on the retailer were Brookside Capital Management, which took on about 8.3 million shares, and Steve Mandel's Lone Pine, which bought about 3.7 million shares. Chase Coleman's Tiger Global Management also bought shares of Michael Kors.