Facebook's Hedge Fund Problem

Wall Street hedge funds are skipping on Facebook as they make tech turnaround bets.
By Antoine Gara ,

Updated from 1:24 p.m ET with Zynga CEO departure and closing Facebook share price

.

NEW YORK (

TheStreet

) --

Facebook

(FB) - Get Report

is in desperate need of a hedge fund spokesperson as the company's shares remain mired well below a $100 billion valuation given to the social network in its May 2012 initial public offering.

For the ordinary investor, or even a burned buyer of Facebook's IPO, the seeming lack of interest by big money investors is troubling. Buying among hedge funds in upcoming quarterly

Securities and Exchange Commission

filings or in large individual holdings, however, could be a sign Wall Street's most influential investors finally see value in the billion-member social network's shares.

Unlike competitors in Silicon Valley who've suffered falling share prices, Facebook has almost no vocal Wall Street investors supporting the company's current stock valuation. Currently, Facebook remains relatively un-owned by the hedge fund community, even as the technology and internet sectors become a favorite of hedge fund activists and value investors.

Meanwhile, as venture capital backers and the company's employees exit Facebook shares through lockup expirations, there is little indication Wall Street mega-funds will emerge as a buyer. In contrast,

AIG

(AIG) - Get Report

and

General Motors

(GM) - Get Report

and bailed out banks became hedge fund favorites as the U.S. Treasury began selling down its crisis time investments.

In recent years, turnarounds at

Yahoo!

(YHOO)

and

Netflix

(NFLX) - Get Report

have been cheered on by hedgies as influential as Daniel Loeb-run

Third Point

and Carl Icahn of

Icahn Associates

.

Third Point was the key Yahoo! investor in pressing for CEO Marissa Mayer's hiring and the company's recent acquisition of

Tumblr

, both of which have been received well by markets. Icahn, meanwhile, has cast crucial support of Netflix as the streaming movie service

diversifies

its content offerings and grows subscribers.

Loeb recently cast his money on the deconsolidation and financial recovery of

Japanese electronics giant

Sony

(SNE) - Get Report

. Icahn, who exited an activist position in Yahoo! around the time Third Point entered, is vying for control of

Dell

(DELL) - Get Report

after becoming the PC-maker's

largest independent shareholder

.

Loeb and Icahn's work in the tech sector is matched across the hedge fund industry.

David Einhorn of

Greenlight Capital Management

recently succeeded

in spurring

Apple

(AAPL) - Get Report

to issue $17 billion in debt to fund

$50 billion

in additional dividends and share repurchases. The iPhone maker is among Greenlight's largest holdings.

As investors await a clear bottoming in Apple shares, Jeffrey Gundlach of

Doubline Capital

has become a buyer of Apple's shares at about $425 apiece,

TheStreet first reported

.

Some struggling recently IPO'ed internet and tech players have seen their shares surge in 2013 as hedge funds finally enter stocks at low prices.

Tiger Global Management, for instance, is benefiting from a more than doubling in

Groupon

(GRPN) - Get Report

shares since becoming one of the daily deal site's largest shareholders in late November. Tiger Global is particularly interested in the potential of Groupon Goods, some sources say. The company also is showing signs of controlling its once-spiraling costs after founder Andrew Mason was ousted as CEO earlier in 2013.

Tiger Global and Barry Rosenstein-run

Jana Partners

have both also recently built large stakes in restructuring Web-gaming startup

Zynga

(ZNGA) - Get Report

, as the company tries to recover from poorly executed R&D spending and acquisitions.

On Monday, Zynga shares surged over 10% to $3.07 after founder Mark Pincus said he would step down as chief executive of the comapany. Former Microsoft executive Don Mattrick will replace Pincus as Zynga's CEO. Pincus will remain chairman of Zynga and the company's chief product officer.

San Francisco-based hedge fund

ValueAct Capital

is benefiting from a

corporate turnaround

at

Adobe

(ADBE) - Get Report

and the value and activist fund's $2 billion investment in

Microsoft

(MSFT) - Get Report

has helped to change investor sentiment in the software giant.

In recent years, Elliott Associates has pushed for the sale of tech hardware and software specialists as big as

BMC Software

. Lone Pine and Starboard Value are other notable funds that have made big tech sector bets, in recent years.

As hedge funds load up on the likes of Sony, Microsoft, Groupon and Zynga, however, there is a notable lack of interest in Facebook.

None of Facebook's 20 biggest shareholders is a hedge fund, according to

Bloomberg

data. Meanwhile, stake sales by early venture capital investors such as

Accel Partners

have spooked some and caused shares to drop.

Of course that could change.

Facebook has recently tried to impress on Wall Street that it is becoming more adept at monetizing the social networking platform's user base and that innovation at the company hasn't slowed. Facebook recently held media events for its

Facebook Home

phone and its Instagram video sharing features.

The ordinary investor, however, may be wise to wait for a large hedge fund to make a bet on Facebook's turnaround before doing so themselves. Facebook shares closed lower in Monday trading to $24.81, about 34% below the company's IPO price.

Bottom Line

: Smart money investors are avoiding Facebook shares as they ante up on tech sector turnaround bets.

-- Written by Antoine Gara in New York.

Follow @antoinegara

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