Filings indicating the end-of-Q3 holdingsfor thousands of Pro investors are beginning to trickle in to the SEC.These filings will be particularly interesting this time around, giventhat they show how Pro investors were positioned just before thehistoric market carnage of October.
Thisis doubly true for Sprott Asset Management, the Canadian firm foundedby high-profile bear Eric Sprott. At a mining industry conference thisweek, Sprott reiterated the view he has held for well over a year.Sprott told attendees, "It's been a very difficult time for everybody.It may... get a lot worse," according to Saskatoon's
StarPhoenix newspaper.
Consideringthe bleak outlook for many developed economies, it's no surprise thatCanadian money manager Sprott Asset Management, wielding a negativeview of the global economy, saw this year as the right time to make itsToronto stock market debut. However, the IPO floundered along with therest of the market, diving from its May IPO price of C$10 to eventuallyhit an all-time low of C$2.49 in October. As a result of the turmoil,Sprott's assets under management dipped from $7.7 billion at the end ofJune to $5.6 billion at the end of September.
Nonetheless, givenSprott's solid track record -- his flagship Canadian Equity Fund isdown -42% this year but sports a 26% 10-year compound annual growthrate -- and his bearish credentials during a historic downturn,investors were curious to see where he was putting his money during Q3.While Sprott, which oversees several mutual funds and hedge funds, hasexposure to many Canadian-listed firms, American investors may beinterested in the various U.S.-listed equities it holds, many of them mining stocks.
By a fairly wide margin, the largest U.S.-listed position in Sprott's portfolio is coal stock James River Coal (Nasdaq: JRCC - News), which Sprott was adding to during Q3 as the coal sector fell out of favor.
Elsewhere, Sprott added stakes in gold miners IAMGOLD (NYSE: IAG - News) and Kinross Gold (NYSE: KGC - News), gold ETF SPDR Gold Trust (NYSE: GLD - News), exploration-stage silver miner Mag Silver (AMEX: MVG - News), and oil and natural gas exploration and production company GMX Resources (Nasdaq: GMXR - News), while trimming stakes in gold miner New Gold (AMEX: NGD - News), egg producer Cal-Maine Foods (Nasdaq: CALM - News), and molybdenum miner General Moly (AMEX: GMO - News). Sprott also opened a new stake in exploration-stage silver miner Solitario Exploration & Royalty (AMEX: XPL - News) during the quarter.
Therest of Sprott's top, U.S.-listed, equity holdings from the end of Q3are available at tickerspy.com. If you want to see how your performancestacks up to Sprott, visit tickerspy.com to see Sprott's top holdings and a chart of their combined performance.
Proportfolio performance is based on institutions' top-15 holdings asdisclosed in quarter-end filings with the SEC. Pro performance does nottake into account additional holdings beyond the top 15 nor does itinclude positions that are not required to be disclosed by the SEC. Assuch, Pro portfolio performance should be considered an approximationand not a precise record of how an institution has performed over time.
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