The Biggest Hedge Fund Moves of Q1 2026, Decoded
In Q1 2026, 652 funds "bought" Versant and 404 "sold" CyberArk. Most of it was not trading. Here is what 13F position changes actually measure, with the real numbers.
The short version
Rank Q1 2026's 13F filings by how many funds opened or closed a position and the list looks dramatic: 652 funds "bought" Versant, 404 "sold" CyberArk. But most of the top rows are corporate actions, not conviction: spin-offs, completed acquisitions, and securities changing identifiers. We show the raw numbers from 1,824 filers, then decode what actually drove each one. The honest version of this analysis is more useful than the naive one.
The most-entered names of Q1 2026
Counting funds whose filings show a brand-new position in the quarter:
| Security | Funds entering | Reported value | Likely driver |
|---|---|---|---|
| Versant Media Group | 652 | $3.9B | Comcast's cable-networks spin-off: every index holder received shares |
| Sunbelt Rentals Holdings | 473 | $17.3B | Ashtead Group's move to a primary U.S. listing under the Sunbelt name |
| AstraZeneca | 309 | $48.2B | New U.S. listing line replacing the old ADR identifier |
| Indivior | 292 | $3.3B | Identifier change tied to U.S. re-domiciliation |
| Waters Corp | 270 | $5.1B | Post-merger identifier change (BD biosciences combination) |
| SanDisk | 254 | $12.8B | Western Digital spin-off |
| Lumentum | 239 | $9.0B | No corporate action found: looks like genuine broad buying |
| Definium Therapeutics | 236 | $1.1B | New identifier began trading this quarter |
| Solstice Advanced Materials | 230 | $1.8B | Honeywell spin-off |
| Pinnacle Financial Partners | 213 | $2.3B | Synovus merger: SNV holders received PNFP shares |
Source: SEC EDGAR Form 13F filings, quarter ended 2026-03-31, effective filings only, options excluded. Ingested by Arkolith 2026-06-12. Driver attributions are inferred from public corporate-action records and the filing patterns themselves.
When hundreds of funds, index giants included, all "initiate" the same position in the same quarter, the explanation is almost never a shared epiphany. It is mechanics: a spin-off distributes shares to every existing holder, a re-listing gives an old position a new identifier, a merger converts one line into another. The standout exception above is Lumentum, where we find no identifier event behind the 239 new holders, making it the clearest case of genuine accumulation in the top ten.
The most-exited names of Q1 2026
| Security | Funds exiting | Likely driver |
|---|---|---|
| CyberArk | 404 | Palo Alto Networks acquisition completing |
| Endeavour Silver | 399 | No deal found; breadth pattern suggests an index or identifier event |
| Comerica | 331 | Fifth Third acquisition completing |
| Dayforce | 289 | Thoma Bravo take-private completing |
| Synovus | 261 | Pinnacle Financial merger (mirror of the entry above) |
| Cadence Bank | 259 | Huntington Bancshares acquisition completing |
| Confluent | 256 | Take-private completing |
| Frontier Communications | 243 | Verizon acquisition completing |
| Civitas Resources | 220 | SM Energy merger |
| Tegna | 213 | Nexstar acquisition completing |
The exit side is even more mechanical: when an acquisition closes, every holder "exits" at once because the security stops existing. A naive screener reads this as 404 funds dumping CyberArk. The correct reading is that the stock was acquired.
The methodology lesson
This is the difference between counting identifier appearances and measuring investor behavior. A 13F position change can mean a trade, or it can mean the security itself changed. Telling them apart requires identifier history, amendment handling, and share-count deltas on stable identifiers, which is exactly the unglamorous resolution work that makes filings data usable. Three practical rules:
- Trust share-count deltas over position appearance. A fund that goes from 1M to 3M shares of a stable identifier bought. A fund whose filing shows a "new" spin-off line did nothing.
- Cross-check breadth spikes against corporate actions. Hundreds of simultaneous entries or exits is a mechanics signature.
- Watch funds with continuous filing history. A manager's first tracked quarter makes every position look new. We filter for this; many screeners do not.
For single-fund moves where the change column is trustworthy, see our Berkshire Hathaway Q1 2026 readout, or follow any manager on the investors leaderboard. Agents and developers can pull position-level change types, with the corporate-action caveats preserved, through the API.
Frequently asked questions about 13F position changes
What does a "new position" in a 13F actually mean?
It means a security identifier appears in a fund's filing that was not in its previous one. That covers real purchases, but also spin-off distributions, re-listings, and merger share conversions.
How do you tell real buying from corporate actions?
Check whether the identifier itself changed (CUSIP history), whether the entry is mirrored by a mass exit of a related security, and whether share counts on stable identifiers moved. Lumentum passes those tests this quarter; Versant does not.
Why do these numbers differ from other 13F trackers?
Mostly amendment handling and option treatment. We use effective filings only (amendments supersede originals), exclude option legs from long-position counts, and synthesize explicit exit rows. Naive aggregation produces different, and usually noisier, lists.
Where is the raw data from?
SEC EDGAR Form 13F filings, parsed with per-datapoint provenance. Every figure above traces to specific accession numbers.
This article reports public regulatory filings. It is not investment advice.
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