Top Funds' Activity in Q2 2025
Sometimes what you don’t do speaks louder than what you do.
With a net worth of about $140 billion, there’s a reason Warren Buffett is considered the ultimate investment guru by so many. As he prepares to step away from his CEO role at Berkshire Hathaway by the end of the year, his followers are running out of time to imitate his moves.
The latest Berkshire trades reveal the house is still on the lookout for cheap shares. It bought a stake in UnitedHealth, the insurer that has dropped 50% over the past 12 months, probably because it sees the selloff as overdone.
And for what it’s worth, David Tepper’s Appaloosa also bought UNH stock in the second quarter. So did Michael Burry, the investor who famously made billions in the 2008-09 financial crisis as dramatized in the movie “The Big Short.” Given the stock’s continued declines before Friday, they may have all lost money so far.
Buffett also snapped up beaten-down house-building shares including Lennar and D.R. Horton. He leaned into a tariff trade with purchases of steel maker Nucor, which is a bet in part that taxes on imports will bolster U.S. producers.
But the biggest takeaway is how little Buffett’s firm bought. Its purchases totaled less than $2 billion, yet it sold more than $4 billion in Apple shares alone. Even the investments the company did make were so small they might have been directed by Buffett’s lieutenants, rather than the Oracle of Omaha himself.
We also know Berkshire was sitting on a cash pile of $344 billion at the end of last quarter. That’s extraordinary—more than a third of the company’s market value of $1 trillion.
Buffett’s caution doesn’t mean stocks won’t keep going up. It’s just that he doesn’t see many bargains right now. Unfortunately it’s not just a ticking clock that his copycats face—it’s a lack of opportunities to mimic.
Andrew Bary, Liz Moyer and Janet H. Cho of Barron's add Berkshire Hathaway’s mystery solved, UnitedHealth is the new stake:
Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway has revealed its mystery stocks, and UnitedHealth Group is one. The conglomerate took on a new five million-share stake in the insurer during the second quarter while trimming its holdings of Apple and Bank of America, according to a quarterly regulatory filing.
- The UnitedHealth stake was about $1.6 billion at the end of June. Holdings could have shifted since then. Berkshire also took on new stakes in home builder Lennar and steel maker Nucor in the quarter, and jumped back into DR Horton with a new 1.5 million share-stake.
- Berkshire sold 20 million shares of Apple for around $4 billion during the second quarter and now owns 280 million shares valued at $65 billion. It also sold 26 million shares of Bank of America, reducing its holding to 605 million shares valued at $28 billion.
- David Tepper’s Appaloosa added to its UnitedHealth stake in the quarter, raising its holdings to 2.45 million shares, or about $764 million. Appaloosa took on a new eight million-share stake in Intel and fellow chip makers Nvidia, Taiwan Semiconductor, and Micron.
- Among other big investment managers, Jeffrey Smith’s Starboard Value increased its stake in Tripadvisor to 8.5 million shares, while Bill Ackman’s Pershing Square reported a new 5.82 million-share stake in Amazon.
What’s Next: Berkshire added to its existing investments in Pool, Constellation Brands, and Chevron in the second quarter, while eliminating a position in T-Mobile US. It reduced its investment in Charter Communications by almost 50% and pared its holding in Liberty Formula One.
It's that time of the quarter again when we get a sneak peek into the holdings of the world's wealthiest and most powerful money managers with a customary 45-day lag (quarter ends June 30 and we get information August 15th so take it with a grain of salt in these highly volatile markets).
There are some more articles to read like:
- Hedge Funds Add Microsoft, Netflix in Position Shuffle: 13F Wrap
- Hedge fund giant Bridgewater pares China bets, offloading stakes in Alibaba and Baidu
- See Which Of The Latest 13F Filers Holds CRM
And there are plenty more, just Google them up.
What I want to do today is teach you how to be better portfolio managers and really understand how to pick your stocks and be cognizant of the risks out there.
Earlier this week, I had a great discussion with Vincent Delisle, Head of Liquid Markets at La Caisse going over their mid-year results and he talked about how quantitative strategies are beating value managers and about tariffs and rising inflation risks, telling me they're not bearish but a lot more cautious as we head toward the last stretch of the year.
Stephen McLennan, CIO of Asset Allocation at OTPP also discussed the risk of rising inflation when I went over OTPP's mid-year results on Monday with him, Gillian Brown and Jo Taylor.
Earlier this week, we also saw US consumer prices rise 2.7% annually in July, less than expected amid tariff worries but that was followed by a hotter-than-expected US PPI reading which took out a 50 basis Fed rate cut in September (they will likely cut by 25 basis points and stay put in December).
In this environment, macro matters a lot, hot inflation readings make investors very nervous because they take Fed rate cuts off the table and increase the risk of boomerang inflation à la 1970s and that will clobber stocks and bonds.
We are obviously far from that, there is still a lot of uncertainty on how this all plays out (read Stephen McLennan's comments) but I guarantee you every large hedge fund and asset manager is worried about what lies ahead.
Also, this has been a weird summer with non-profitable tech shares partying like it's 1999 and stocks like Newegg Commerce leading the charge higher (with insane volatility):
I commented and said when you see Apple leading the Mag 7, start worrying.
Buffett, Tepper and UnitedHealth (UNH)
"Leo, don't bore me with macro and market mumbo jumbo, all I want to know is should I follow Buffet and Tepper and buy UnitedHealth stock which popped 12% today but is still cheap and is making a one-month high":
Alright, let me answer your question, I couldn't care less what Buffett, Tepper, Dalio, Griffin and company are buying, when I analyze a stock, I don't pretend I have more information than these guys but I also doubt they have as much edge as the media leads you to believe.
For me, looking at the 5-year weekly chart, it's still broken, there's a lot of damage here and the stock remains cheap and deeply oversold for a reason:
Yes, it popped over its 10-week exponential moving average today on the Buffett/ Tepper hoopla but it has a long, long way to go to reach previous highs and there will be plenty of selloffs along the way.
Market makers play retail investors for fools here with all this news so be very careful thinking this is a slam dunk stock, it might be or it might linger for a while.
I prefer to see chart confirmation, the recent uptick in the weekly MACD is encouraging but it's still way below zero and there are so many better stocks to buy now based on the technical levels I look at.
"I don't give a damn what you think Leo, I will follow Buffet, Tepper and Dr. Michael Burry and buy UNH here, and the hell with you!"
Be my guest, I'm teaching you valuable tools to analyze markets and stocks, if you want to follow Buffett and Tepper and buy UnitedHealth or Intel which Tepper bought.
I actually like Intel more than UnitedHealth at this juncture as the weekly MACD goes positive:
My point is don't get too enamoured with what gurus are buying, understand the fundamentals and technicals of what you are buying and I prefer weekly over daily charts for nice swing trades.
Links to Top Money Managers' Portfolios
Alright let me wrap it up here and let you all explore the portfolios of top money managers.
There are a lot of gems in here and it's not only mega cap tech shares.
For example, in biotech, despite insane volatility (and manipulation), I continue to like shares of Iovance Biotherapeutics (IOVA) and Viking Therapeutics (VKTX) but there are so many other names I like and not just biotech.
The links below take you straight to the top holdings of top money managers and then click to see where they increased and decreased their holdings.
Top multi-strategy, event driven hedge funds and large hedge fund managers
As the name implies, these hedge funds invest across a wide variety of
hedge fund strategies like L/S Equity, L/S credit, global macro,
convertible arbitrage, risk arbitrage, volatility arbitrage, merger
arbitrage, distressed debt and statistical pair trading. Below are links
to the holdings of some top multi-strategy hedge funds I track
closely:
1) Appaloosa LP
2) Citadel Advisors
3) Balyasny Asset Management
4) Point72 Asset Management (Steve Cohen)
5) Millennium Management
6) Farallon Capital Management
7) Shonfeld Strategic Partners
10) Peak6 Investments
11) Kingdon Capital Management
12) HBK Investments
13) Highbridge Capital Management
14) Highland Capital Management
15) Hudson Bay Capital Management
16) Pentwater Capital Management
17) Sculptor Capital Management (formerly known as Och-Ziff Capital Management)
18) ExodusPoint Capital Management
19) Carlson Capital Management
20) Magnetar Capital
21) Whitebox Advisors
22) QVT Financial
23) Paloma Partners
24) Weiss Multi-Strategy Advisors
25) York Capital Management
Top Global Macro Hedge Funds and Family Offices
These hedge funds gained notoriety because of George Soros, arguably the
best and most famous hedge fund manager. Global macros typically
invest across fixed income, currency, commodity and equity markets.
George Soros, Carl Icahn, Stanley Druckenmiller, Julian Robertson have
converted their hedge funds into family offices to manage their own
money.
1) Soros Fund Management
2) Icahn Associates
3) Duquesne Family Office (Stanley Druckenmiller)
4) Bridgewater Associates
5) Pointstate Capital Partners
6) Caxton Associates (Bruce Kovner)
7) Tudor Investment Corporation (Paul Tudor Jones)
8) Discovery Capital Management (Rob Citrone)
9) Moore Capital Management
10) Rokos Capital Management
11) Element Capital
12) Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation Trust (Michael Larson, the man behind Gates)
Top Quant and Market Neutral Hedge Funds
These funds use sophisticated mathematical algorithms to make their
returns, typically using high-frequency models so they churn their
portfolios often. A few of them have outstanding long-term track records
and many believe quants are taking over the world.
They typically only hire PhDs in mathematics, physics and computer
science to develop their algorithms. Market neutral funds will
engage in pair trading to remove market beta. Some are large asset
managers that specialize in factor investing.
1) Alyeska Investment Group
2) Renaissance Technologies
3) DE Shaw & Co.
4) Two Sigma Investments
5) Cubist Systematic Strategies (a quant division of Point72)
6) Man Group
7) Analytic Investors
8) AQR Capital Management
9) Dimensional Fund Advisors
10) Quantitative Investment Management
11) Oxford Asset Management
12) PDT Partners
13) TPG Angelo Gordon
14) Quantitative Systematic Strategies
15) Quantitative Investment Management
16) Bayesian Capital Management
17) SABA Capital Management
18) Quadrature Capital
19) Simplex Trading
Top Deep Value, Activist, Growth at a Reasonable Price, Event Driven and Distressed Debt Funds
These are among the top long-only funds that everyone tracks. They
include funds run by legendary investors like Warren Buffet, Seth
Klarman, Ron Baron and Ken Fisher. Activist investors like to make
investments in companies where management lacks the proper incentives to
maximize shareholder value. They differ from traditional L/S hedge
funds by having a more concentrated portfolio. Distressed debt funds
typically invest in debt of a company but sometimes take equity
positions.
1) Abrams Capital Management (the one-man wealth machine)
2) Berkshire Hathaway
3) TCI Fund Management
4) Baron Partners Fund (click here to view other Baron funds)
5) BHR Capital
6) Fisher Asset Management
7) Baupost Group
8) Fairfax Financial Holdings
9) Fairholme Capital
10) Gotham Asset Management
11) Fir Tree Partners
12) Elliott Investment Management (Paul Singer)
13) Jana Partners
14) Miller Value Partners (Bill Miller)
15) Highfields Capital Management
16) Eminence Capital
17) Pershing Square Capital Management
18) New Mountain Vantage Advisers
19) Atlantic Investment Management
20) Polaris Capital Management
21) Third Point
22) Marcato Capital Management
23) Glenview Capital Management
24) Apollo Management
25) Avenue Capital
26) Armistice Capital
27) Blue Harbor Group
28) Brigade Capital Management
29) Caspian Capital
30) Kerrisdale Advisers
31) Knighthead Capital Management
32) Relational Investors
33) Roystone Capital Management
34) Scopia Capital Management
35) Schneider Capital Management
36) ValueAct Capital
37) Vulcan Value Partners
38) Okumus Fund Management
39) Eagle Capital Management
40) Sasco Capital
41) Lyrical Asset Management
42) Gabelli Funds
43) Brave Warrior Advisors
44) Matrix Asset Advisors
45) Jet Capital
46) Conatus Capital Management
47) Starboard Value
48) Pzena Investment Management
49) Trian Fund Management
50) Oaktree Capital Management
52) Southeastern Asset Management
Top Long/Short Hedge Funds
These hedge funds go long shares they think will rise in value and short
those they think will fall. Along with global macro funds, they
command the bulk of hedge fund assets. There are many L/S funds but
here is a small sample of some well-known funds.
1) Adage Capital Management
2) Viking Global Investors
3) Greenlight Capital
4) Maverick Capital
5) Pointstate Capital Partners
6) Marathon Asset Management
7) Tiger Global Management (Chase Coleman)
8) Coatue Management
9) D1 Capital Partners
10) Artis Capital Management
11) Fox Point Capital Management
12) Jabre Capital Partners
13) Lone Pine Capital
14) Paulson & Co.
15) Bronson Point Management
16) Hoplite Capital Management
17) LSV Asset Management
18) Hussman Strategic Advisors
19) Cantillon Capital Management
20) Brookside Capital Management
21) Blue Ridge Capital
22) Iridian Asset Management
23) Clough Capital Partners
24) GLG Partners LP
25) Cadence Capital Management
26) Honeycomb Asset Management
27) New Mountain Vantage
28) Penserra Capital Management
29) Eminence Capital
30) Steadfast Capital Management
31) Brookside Capital Management
32) PAR Capital Capital Management
33) Gilder, Gagnon, Howe & Co
34) Brahman Capital
35) Bridger Management
36) Kensico Capital Management
37) Kynikos Associates
38) Soroban Capital Partners
39) Passport Capital
40) Pennant Capital Management
41) Mason Capital Management
42) Tide Point Capital Management
43) Sirios Capital Management
44) Hayman Capital Management
45) Highside Capital Management
46) Tremblant Capital Group
47) Decade Capital Management
48) Suvretta Capital Management
49) Bloom Tree Partners
50) Cadian Capital Management
51) Matrix Capital Management
52) Senvest Partners
53) Falcon Edge Capital Management
54) Park West Asset Management
55) Melvin Capital Partners (Plotkin shut down Melvin after reeling rom Redditor attack)
56) Owl Creek Asset Management
57) Portolan Capital Management
58) Proxima Capital Management
59) Tourbillon Capital Partners
60) Impala Asset Management
61) Valinor Management
62) Marshall Wace
63) Light Street Capital Management
64) Rock Springs Capital Management
65) Rubric Capital Management
66) Whale Rock Capital
67) Skye Global Management
68) York Capital Management
69) Zweig-Dimenna Associates
Top Sector and Specialized Funds
I like tracking activity funds that specialize in real estate, biotech,
healthcare, retail and other sectors like mid, small and micro caps.
Here are some funds worth tracking closely.
1) Avoro Capital Advisors (formerly Venbio Select Advisors)
2) Baker Brothers Advisors
3) Perceptive Advisors
4) RTW Investments
5) Healthcor Management
6) Orbimed Advisors
7) Deerfield Management
8) BB Biotech AG
9) Birchview Capital
10) Ghost Tree Capital
11) Soleus Capital Management
12) Oracle Investment Management
13) Palo Alto Investors
14) Consonance Capital Management
15) Camber Capital Management
16) Redmile Group
17) Casdin Capital
18) Bridger Capital Management
19) Boxer Capital
21) Bridgeway Capital Management
22) Cohen & Steers
23) Cardinal Capital Management
24) Munder Capital Management
25) Diamondhill Capital Management
26) Cortina Asset Management
27) Geneva Capital Management
28) Criterion Capital Management
29) Daruma Capital Management
30) 12 West Capital Management
31) RA Capital Management
32) Sarissa Capital Management
33) Rock Springs Capital Management
34) Senzar Asset Management
35) Paradigm Biocapital Advisors
36) Sphera Funds
37) Tang Capital Management
38) Thomson Horstmann & Bryant
39) Ecor1 Capital
40) Opaleye Management
41) NEA Management Company
42) Sofinnova Investments
43) Great Point Partners
44) Tekla Capital Management
45) Van Berkom and Associates
Mutual Funds and Asset Managers
Mutual funds and large asset managers are not hedge funds but their
sheer size makes them important players. Some asset managers have
excellent track records. Below, are a few funds investors track closely.
1) Fidelity
2) BlackRock Inc
3) Wellington Management
4) AQR Capital Management
5) Sands Capital Management
6) Brookfield Asset Management
7) Dodge & Cox
8) Eaton Vance Management
9) Grantham, Mayo, Van Otterloo & Co.
10) Geode Capital Management
11) Goldman Sachs Group
12) JP Morgan Chase & Co.
13) Morgan Stanley
14) Manulife Asset Management
15) UBS Asset Management
16) Barclays Global Investor
17) Epoch Investment Partners
18) Thornburg Investment Management
19) Kornitzer Capital Management
20) Batterymarch Financial Management
21) Tocqueville Asset Management
22) Neuberger Berman
23) Winslow Capital Management
24) Herndon Capital Management
25) Artisan Partners
26) Great West Life Insurance Management
27) Lazard Asset Management
28) Janus Capital Management
29) Franklin Resources
30) Capital Research Global Investors
31) T. Rowe Price
32) First Eagle Investment Management
33) Frontier Capital Management
34) Akre Capital Management
35) Brandywine Global
36) Brown Capital Management
37) Victory Capital Management
38) Orbis Allan Gray
39) Ariel Investments
40) ARK Investment Management
Canadian Asset Managers
Here are a few Canadian funds I track closely:
1) Addenda Capital
2) Letko, Brosseau and Associates
3) Fiera Capital Corporation
4) West Face Capital
5) Hexavest
6) 1832 Asset Management
7) Jarislowsky, Fraser
8) Connor, Clark & Lunn Investment Management
9) TD Asset Management
10) CIBC Asset Management
11) Beutel, Goodman & Co
12) Greystone Managed Investments
13) Mackenzie Financial Corporation
14) Great West Life Assurance Co
15) Guardian Capital
16) Scotia Capital
17) AGF Investments
18) Montrusco Bolton
19) CI Investments
20) Venator Capital Management
21) Van Berkom and Associates
22) Formula Growth
23) Hillsdale Investment Management
Pension Funds, Endowment Funds, Sovereign Wealth Funds and the Fed's Swiss Surrogate
Last but not least, I the track activity of some pension funds,
endowment, sovereign wealth funds and the Swiss National Bank (aka the Fed's Swiss surrogate). Below, a
sample of the funds I track closely:
1) Alberta Investment Management Corporation (AIMco)
2) Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan
3) Canada Pension Plan Investment Board
4) Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec
5) OMERS Administration Corp.
6) Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (HOOPP)
7) British Columbia Investment Management Corporation (BCI)
8) Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP Investments)
9) PGGM Investments
10) APG All Pensions Group
11) California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS)
12) California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS)
13) New York State Common Fund
14) New York State Teachers Retirement System
15) State Board of Administration of Florida Retirement System
16) State of Wisconsin Investment Board
17) State of New Jersey Common Pension Fund
18) Public Employees Retirement System of Ohio
19) STRS Ohio
20) Teacher Retirement System of Texas
21) Virginia Retirement Systems
22) TIAA CREF investment Management
23) Harvard Management Co.
24) Norges Bank
25) Nordea Investment Management
26) Korea Investment Corp.
27) Singapore Temasek Holdings
28) Yale Endowment Fund
29) Swiss National Bank (aka, the Fed's Swiss surrogate)
Next, CNBC’s Bertha Coombs breaks down some of United’s big buyers and sellers from the latest round of investment funds’13F filings.
Third, Stephanie Link, CIO at Hightower, joins CNBC's "Halftime Report" to detail her latest buy and the Investment Committee debate her trade as well as Berkshire Hathaway taking a stake in the beleaguered insurance company.
Lastly, the Investment Committee take stock of the market and debate how to trade it right now.
Update: Read my follow up market comment, Dovish Fed Remarks Revive Animal Spirit son Wall Street where I discuss the Fed and why the dip in Viking therapeutics shares should be bought hard.
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