Building a Consensus Signal from 13F Filing Data: Where Smart Money Agrees (and Disagrees)

When dozens of institutional investors — each managing $100B+ — independently hold the same stock, that's a signal worth quantifying. The Concept Every quarter, institutional managers with $100M+ file 13F forms. Consensus analysis identifies stocks with the highest overlap across a selected group. Q4 2025: What the Data Shows Stock Signal NVDA Top-5 at virtually every major filer — universal consensus GOOGL Unanimous directional adds — every major filer increased position AVGO Surging into top-5 at multiple filers SPY Massive divergence — some banks cut 50%+, others doubled That SPY divergence is the interesting signal. When the most-traded ETF generates strong disagreement, the largest managers have fundamentally different market views. Consensus vs. Combined Consensus : "Which stocks do the most filers agree on?" Counts appearances. Combined : "If you merged all portfolios, what would it look like?" Sums dollar values. Use consensus for breadth of conviction, combined for depth. The