Insider Trades

The President of Yum! Brands, Inc. (NYSE: YUM) China Rest., Jing-Shyh Samuel Su, disclosed the sale of 54,282 shares on 11/17 at $36, bringing his stake to 266,813.

Su exercised options on 4,282 of the shares which were set to expire on 01/27/2010.

In a letter to clients of his Paulson & Co. hedge fund, investing guru John Paulson said he thinks shares of Bank of America (NYSE: BAC) can double in the next two years.

In the letter obtained by Bloomberg news, Paulson said shares of Bank of America could rise to $29.81 by December 2011 as writedowns ease. "Banks will have passed the current writedown cycle and have visibility for growth in 2012," the letter said.

Paulson's latest quarterly filing showed he owned 159,794,229 common shares of Bank of America, down from 167,990,464 shares. He said while the fund is up on its investment in Bank of America "considerable upside remains."

Among other banks stocks, in the quarter ended September 30, Paulson also accumulated 300,000,000 million shares of Citigroup (NYSE: C), lowered his stake in JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) and liquidated his stake in Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS).

Paulson gained notable fame over the past few years after making billions for himself and his firm betting against the US housing market.

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Stephen Mandel's Lone Pine Capital hedge fund released its 13F for the quarter ended Sept. 30, 2009 yesterday. Mandel upped his bet in a major bank, showed new stakes in a major smartphone maker and a single-cup coffee maker, and trimmed his stakes in the two major credit card processors.

Some notable moves from Lone Pine:

• - Raised stake in JP Morgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) by 3.82 million shares to 16,361,128 shares
  
• - Raised stake in Monsanto (NYSE: MON) by 588K shares to 8,393,377
  
• - Raised stake in HP (NYSE: HPQ) by 1.39 million shares to 9,849,811 shares
  
• - Raised stake in Southwestern Energy Co. (SWN) by 3.35 million shares to 5,048,827 shares
  
• - New 3,091,318 share stake in Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL)
  
• - New 3,803,287 share stake in Green Mountain Coffee (Nasdaq: GMCR)
  
• - Lowered stake in QUALCOMM (Nasdaq: QCOM) by 4.18 million shares to 11,723,977 shares
  
• - Lowered stake in McDonald's (NYSE: MCD) by 2.09 million shares to 6,362,563 shares
  
• - Lowered stake in Priceline.com (Nasdaq: PCLN) by 488K shares to 1,851,394 shares
  
• - Lowered stake in Visa (NYSE: V) by 2.38 million shares to 4,411,072 shares
  
• - Lowered stake in MasterCard (NYSE: MA) by 4.22 million shares to 1,195,615 shares
  
• - Lowered stake in Coca-Cola (NYSE: KO) by 2.17 million shares to 3,471,263 shares
  
• - Liquidated 4.5 million share stake in Nike (NYSE: NKE)
  
• - Liquidated 1.95 million share stake in Union Pacific (NYSE: UNP)
  
• - Liquidated 1.8 million share stake in Vistaprint (Nasdaq: VPRT)
  
• - Liquidated 5.42 million share stake in Urban Outfitters (Nasdaq: URBN)
  
• - Liquidated 2.47 million share stake in XTO Energy (NYSE: XTO)

Yesterday, John Griffin's Blue Ridge Capital hedge fund released its 13F for the quarter ended September 30, 2009. Griffin showed a new stake in a mega-bank, swapped out of individual gold miners in favor of the the ETF, jumped on more silver, and made some moves in two major tech stocks.

Some notable moves from Blue Ridge:

Carl Icahn's Icahn Capital hedge fund disclosed a new 1,450,800 share stake in Genzyme Corp. (Nasdaq: GENZ).

This is interesting as GENZ has been getting pounded recently due to quality issues with the FDA. Icahn has had success with biotech/pharma.

Maybe Icahn can spark a rally in the stock.

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