First published June 1, 2025
You can almost smell the rubber and diesel behind the numbers.
On Friday, with Wall Street wheezing toward the weekend, Two Sigma Investments quietly pulled the plug on nearly two-thirds of its Cummins stake. Just 7,287 shares remain on their books – a retreat to the bunker. Over $2.5 million still parked in CMI, but the maths says they’re not betting on a comeback. Not anytime soon.
This wasn’t a lone gambler cashing out. Temasek, Toronto Dominion, Shell Asset Management – all playing musical chairs around the Cummins table. Some bought in, others slid chips across the table and got out. But there’s a rhythm here. One that sounds like institutional nerves humming beneath the bonnet.
Goldman Sachs, in full contradiction, just upgraded Cummins to a “Buy.” The same week Two Sigma bailed. That should tell you something.
Because the disconnect isn’t just financial. It’s cultural. Strategic. Ethical.
Cummins’ numbers are strong – on paper. A surprise Q1 beat, nearly $6 EPS, a dividend as stable as Midwest pavement. But investors like Two Sigma read between the rows on the spreadsheet. They see the slow burn: headlines about internal dissent, legal dust-ups, social accountability campaigns turning up the heat. A Twitter storm here. A whistleblower blog there. Quiet pressure mounting from the inside and out.
You can hear it in the analyst chatter too. UBS slashed their price target by 40%. Truist downshifted to “Hold.” The once-assumed narrative – diesel royalty pivoting to green future – isn’t tracking as cleanly anymore. Behind the glossy ESG brochures, some investors are starting to ask the kind of uncomfortable questions Cummins can’t answer with a dividend hike.
Maybe it’s the allegations of hypocrisy in DEI policies. Or the silence over unresolved antisemitism claims tied to senior personnel. Or the mounting Employment Tribunal battles the company would rather keep off the books.
Whatever the trigger, the suits in the tower are starting to sweat. And no Goldman thumbs-up is going to stop the rot if trust – not torque – becomes the deciding factor.
The stock still has horsepower. But investors? They’re checking the oil. And some, like Two Sigma, aren’t liking what they see on the dipstick.
Lee Thompson – Founder, The Cummins Accountability Project
Source: MarketBeat article, June 1, 2025
Corporate filings: SEC Form 13F, Q4 2024