Michael Burry’s investment firm closed its wager against the S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 indexes and, as of the end of September, was betting against a basket of semiconductor stocks that includes Nvidia Corp., according to a regulatory filing Tuesday.
Scion Asset Management trimmed its holdings to just 13 positions, liquidating bets on about two dozen stocks and ETFs, according to the 13-F filing. As part of the shift, the firm put on a bearish options position against a fund that tracks chipmakers.
It had notional value of $47.4 million, based on the iShares Semiconductor exchange-traded fund’s closing price at the end of September. The actual value of the options position is far less, and depends on the exact contracts that were bought.
Among the other changes in Scion’s filing, the firm retook long positions in Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and JD.com Inc. after ditching the shares in the second quarter. In the period between the end of June and September, Alibaba stock rose 4.1% while JD.com plunged 15%.
Automaker Stellantis NV became Scion’s top holding as the hedge fund added 75,000 shares to bring its position to $7.65 million at the end of the third quarter. The firm exited its former top position in Expedia Group Inc. while shedding shares of retailer Qurate Retail Inc.
Burry, the money manager made famous by the book “The Big Short,” closed his firm’s bearish options positions against the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust (SPY) ETF and the Invesco QQQ Trust Series 1. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 indexes peaked for the year in July and ended the quarter down 3.7% and 3.1% in the period, respectively.
That bet against the biggest US stocks, put on some time in the second quarter, captured the attention of social media as the notional value came in at more than $1 billion. A closer look, however, showed the wager was more nuanced.
Tuesday is the deadline for institutional investors, including hedge funds and pension funds, to report certain US equity holdings to the Securities and Exchange Commission. Since the data tracks holdings through the end of September, funds could have changed positions in the past month and a half.
This article was provided by Bloomberg News.