Are you ready for some ‘Hedge Fund Hot Dogs’?! Following the release of hedge fund trades for the first quarter, RBC Capital is out with a list of the most popular hedge fund stocks right now. It calls these stocks “Hedge Fund Hot Dogs,” i.e. the stocks with the most hedge fund dollars invested in them. This group of stocks has outperformed strongly since 2010 – “a testament to active management” according to RBC Capital’s Lori Calvasina.

Alongside the well-known big guns like Facebook (Nasdaq:FB) (the no.1 top hedge fund stock) there are also a number of newcomers to the Top 20 list. Here we use TipRanks’ big data capabilities to delve into the outlook of three of these new stocks. TipRanks tracks the latest ratings from over 4,700 analysts meaning you can both 1) see the overall analyst consensus rating and 2) find out what the best-performing analysts have to say about a specific stock.

Electronic Arts (Nasdaq:EA)

Welcome to our first newcomer to the hedge fund top stock list. Video games giant EA has joined the list at 17thplace. Hedge funds have $5.53 billion invested in this hot gaming stock- which pops up in 17% of the 340 hedge fund portfolios covered by RBC. If you look at the Street take on EA, this makes sense. In the last three months, 10 analysts have published buy ratings on EA- no hold or sell ratings here. Plus their average price target of $146 indicates 10% upside from current levels.

Interestingly, EA is outperforming despite the huge success of Epic’s Fortnite. Top Jefferies analyst Timothy O’Shea explains why here: “EA is now the third straight US video game publisher to post strong results despite Fortnite being the hottest game in years, suggesting Fortnite is more about expanding the market than cannibalizing it.”

He notes that EPS of $1.28 was well ahead of $1.16 consensus and full year guide of $4.85 seems conservative. At the same time, the “F’19 setup seems very strong with the release slate anchored by FIFA and Battlefield, EA’s two biggest franchises.” Looking much further ahead, O’Shea sees huge potential for EA as “games will become ubiquitous across all platforms and devices, and cloud-based services will increase the addressable market by a factor of four.” In his May 9 report, O’Shea reiterated his $150 price target on EA (13% upside potential). You can click on the graph below for further insights into all the latest market activity on EA:

UnitedHealth Group (NYSE:UNH)

One of the US’s largest health insurance companies, UNH is winning over both hedge funds and analysts right now. Hedge funds currently have a whopping $5.25 billion invested in UNH- making it the 19th most popular hedge fund stock. We can also see that 17% of hedge funds in the study own UNH- so what is it that makes this stock so special?

For top-rated Oppenheimer analyst Michael Wiederhorn, the answer is clear: “The company remains the premier operator in the healthcare services universe, with many competitors trying to emulate its business model.” He continues: “We believe UNH is well positioned by virtue of its diversification, strong track record, elite management team and exposure to certain higher growth businesses.”

And don’t forget that UNH also boasts its lucrative Optum business. According to Wiederhorn Optum “is a nice complement to its core managed care operations and continues to account for a large share of earnings.” Turning to Q1 results, we can see that Optum revenues soared +11% y-y to $23.6B with earnings also up +29% to $1.7B.

He has a $276 price target on UNH- which (as the graph below shows) is exactly in line with the Street- and translates into upside potential of just over 11%. Impressively, UNH has received eight consecutive buy ratings from analysts in the last three months.

Mastercard (NYSE:MA)

Our third ‘hot dog’ is online payments giant Mastercard. RBC Capital reveals that 19% of the tracked hedge funds hold MA with a total of $5.17 billion invested. This makes MA the 20th most popular hedge fund stock right now. Luckily for these funds, the Street is just as bullish on Mastercard’s outlook.

Indeed, top Tigress Financial analyst Ivan Feinseth calls MA one of his top stock picks. He explains: We reiterate our Strong Buy rating on MA as growth in gross dollar volume (GDV) and increasing market share penetration continues to drive accelerating Business Performance. Plus “2018 will continue to be another strong year as MA continues to benefit from positive global macroeconomic trends.” Given this upbeat take, it’s not surprising that MA remains on the firm’s Research Focus List and Focus Opportunity Portfolio.

Overall our data reveals that this Strong Buy stock has scores 11 buy ratings in the last three months. Only one analyst has stayed on the sidelines. Meanwhile, the average analyst price target of $205 indicates just over 7% upside from the current share price. However- this is just the average. SunTrust’s Andrew Jeffrey recently ramped up his price target to $215, while calling MA the “most innovative and competitively advantaged Payments ecosystem participant.”