Which Institutional Investors Upped Their Stakes in Microsoft In The Second Quarter?



A number of institutional investors took advantage of Microsoft's rocky Q2 performance ($29.16 to $23.01 with $0.26 in dividends) and loaded up on shares of the Redmond, Washington software behemoth.

We tracked 96 of the largest institutional investors in the world during Q2, and here is a quick breakdown of their activities as it relates to Microsoft:

5 new outright buys:

Jana Partners LLC, 1,955,660 shares
TPG-Axon Capital Management, LP, 9,825,000 shares
Basso Capital Management LP, 78,601 shares
Black River Asset Management LLC, 68,300 shares
Canyon Capital Advisors LLC, 282,340 shares

5 new outright sales of existing positions:

Duquesne Capital Management LLC, 1,050,700 shares
Corsair Capital Management LLC, 10,000 shares
Fox Point Capital Management LLC, 250,000 shares
Defiance Asset Management LLC, 129,619 shares
Brahman Capital Corp., 1,111,800 shares

Microsoft Logo - Small sizeAlright - nothing too interesting so far. 5 new buys and 5 outright sells.

Now let's look at the companies who added to their existing positions in MSFT in the second quarter.

Of the 96 funds that we tracked in our database in Q2, 25 chose to increase their positions in the software firm in the second quarter, while 12 chose to reduce their holdings.

Some of the names who decided to up their stakes in MSFT during Q2 were:

Goldman Sachs Group Inc - +34,550,224 shares
Renaissance Technologies LLC - +21,632,684 shares
Janus Capital Management LLC - +5,987,479 shares
Greenlight Capital Inc - +4,260,442 shares
Citadel Advisors LLC - +1,354,752 shares

You are in some pretty impressive company if you also decided to increase your stake in Microsoft during Q2.

Some of the 12 companies who cut their stakes in Microsoft during Q2 were:

FMR LLC, -52,939,979 shares
Davis Selected Advisors, -20,412,821 shares
GLG Partners, Inc, -1,413,410 shares

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Another interesting note - MSFT was tied for third with Bank of America (BAC) as the most widely held stock amongst the 96 funds that we tracked in the second quarter. 43 of the 96 funds that we tracked held at least some MSFT shares at the end of the second quarter.

Source: Q2 Fund Report