Greenlight Capital’s David Einhorn continued to pick up new stocks in the first quarter, including Penn Entertainment , as the longtime value investor struggles to find opportunities in the volatile market. In an investor letter dated Wednesday and obtained by CNBC, the hedge fund manager revealed that he had built a midsized position in Penn Entertainment in the three months ended in March. He established the stake at an average cost of $22.69 per share, but the stock has fallen to $17.44 as of Wednesday. He said the decline was mainly due to investor doubt about Penn’s foray into sports betting after the abandoned acquisition of Barstool Sports. Still, Einhorn said sports betting, if executed right, could take the shares much higher. “Successful sports betting franchises can have substantial value,” he said in the letter. “Were the market to credit PENN with merely 15% of DraftKings’ value, that segment alone would be worth $20 per share.” Q4 buyer’s strike Einhorn had stopped building new stock positions at one point in the fourth quarter, saying he was on a “buyer’s strike” due to worries about intensifying geopolitical risks. His hedge fund returned 4.9% in the first quarter of 2024, net of fees and expenses. That compares with the S & P 500â²s 10.6% gain during the same period. Einhorn, a 55-year-old Cornell grad, founded Greenlight Capital in 1996 and went on to produce a whopping 26% annualized return for the next decade, far outpacing the broader market and many peers. The hedge fund investor also revealed a first-quarter stake in HP , which he said stands to benefit from the boom in artificial intelligence. Einhorn said not only does he like HP’s aggressive buyback and dividend strategy, but he’s also betting on an AI-driven personal computer adoption cycle. Greenlight also took new stakes in biotech name Roivant Sciences and the Class A shares of Liberty Global (LBTYA ). â CNBC’s Leslie Picker contributed reporting.
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