Bridgewater Associates has resolved the sexual harassment claim that rocked the Westport, Connecticut firm last month when the dispute went public. According to Business Insider, Christopher Tarui withdrew the complaint against his supervisor, which he had filed earlier in the year. Tarui joined private equity giant KKR earlier this week, according to the report. Tarui, who helped raise money for Bridgewater, had described the world’s largest hedge fund firm as a “cauldron of fear and intimidation.”
Meanwhile, Bridgewater disclosed in its quarterly regulatory filing that it trimmed its three largest positions — all exchange traded funds — in the second quarter. Even so, the three ETFs combined still roughly account for three-quarters of the multistrategy firm’s nearly $8 billion equity portfolio. However, to put this into perspective, equities are a tiny part of the firm’s overall assets, which currently stand at around $150 billion.
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Tybourne Capital Management disclosed it owns 10.1 percent of brewery The Boston Beer Company, Inc., as of July 31. Hong Kong–based Tybourne is headed by Viswanathan (Eashwar) Krishnan, who was previously a senior analyst at Stephen Mandel Jr.’s Greenwich, Connecticut–based Lone Pine Capital.
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Shares of hedge fund favorite Yelp surged nearly 13 percent on Wednesday, to close at $36.83, after several analysts raised their price targets following the company’s reporting better-than-expected quarterly results. Deutsche Bank, for example, boosted its price target from $33 to $41 and maintained its buy recommendation, noting it sees further upside to consensus estimates for the website, which is used to search and review local businesses. UBS raised its target from $17 to $25 but maintained its sell recommendation.
“While we have been wrong in our Sell rating over the last few months, we see continued pressures over the long-term as Yelp competes for local ad dollar growth against large scaled ad platforms,” it stresses in a note to clients. Its biggest concerns: traffic growth continues to decelerate or moderate and investment costs are rising. At the end of the first quarter, Tybourne was the largest shareholder, with 9 percent of the shares, while Dallas-based Maverick Capital was the second-largest shareholder with about 8 percent of the shares and New York-based Greenlight Capital was the fourth. Other top-ten holders included New York-based EastBay Asset Management and Chicago-based Citadel.
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UBS raised its price target on hedge fund favorite Charter Communications from $278 to $290 and maintained its buy rating, stressing the move reflects its long-term model and discounted cash flow analysis. At the end of the first quarter, the cable giant was the eighteenth-most popular stock among hedge funds, held by at least 99 firms, according to Goldman Sachs. On Wednesday, the stock fell a little less than 1 percent, to close at $254.07.
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Deutsche Bank raised its price target on TransDigm Group, a favorite among the Tiger Management crowd, from $260 to $300. In a note to clients, the bank concedes the aircraft component maker reported mixed results in its most recent quarterly report. However, it also tells clients it expects a special dividend of $20 per share over the next few months. Even so, it maintained its hold rating on the stock, which closed Wednesday at $287.60. At the end of the first quarter, 10 of the 49 funds headed by managers with roots in Julian Robertson Jr.’s New York-based firm held a position in the stock, according to Novus, which tracks hedge fund stock holdings.
