Einhorn Drops Stakes in Apple, Micron, Twitter

Greenlight Capital, run by billionaire David Einhorn, is slashing its holding in soaring tech stocks Apple Inc. (AAPL), Micron Technology Inc. (MU), and Twitter Inc. (TWTR), according to a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Greenlight cut its stake in Apple by 77%, or 486,000 shares, according to an SEC 13-F filing. It reduced its Micron holdings by 92%, or 3.1 million shares, and its Twitter holdings by 36%, or 901,400 shares.

All three tech companies have outperformed the market this year. So far this year, Apple stock is up 23.4%, Micron is up 24.9% and Twitter is up 36.6%.

Greenlight's Capital Losses

Even with the gains in technology holdings, Greenlight’s fund overall has underperformed Einhorn’s expectations, he said in a letter to investors last month. Greenlight lost about 5.4% in the second quarter, for a year-to-date (YTD) loss of 18.3% through June. That contrasts sharply with broader market gains—the S&P 500 was up 2.6% YTD at the end of June.

"Over the past three years, our results have been far worse than we could have imagined, and it's been a bull market to boot," wrote Einhorn. "Right now the market is telling us we are wrong, wrong, wrong about nearly everything."

Much of Greenlight's losses were attributable to wrong-way bets on Tesla Inc. (TSLA​​​​​​​) and General Motors Co. (GM). (See also: Tesla Analysts Sharply Boost Profit Forecast.)