NEW YORK, May 15 (Reuters) - Hudson Bay Capital

Management, Geode Capital Management and Morgan Stanley ( MS ) were

among the large institutional investors that took positions in

Donald Trump's Trump Media & Technology Group ( DJT ) in the

first quarter, securities filings showed on Wednesday.

The former president, who is running as the Republican

candidate in the Nov. 5 presidential election, holds a majority

stake in the company. It owns social media site Truth Social,

where Trump has 7 million followers and is a prolific poster.

Hudson Bay Capital bought 150,000 shares in the quarter,

initiating a position worth nearly $10 million at the end of

March and now worth about $7.8 million. Geode Capital

Management, a spinoff of mutual fund giant Fidelity, bought

102,923 shares during the quarter, while Morgan Stanley ( MS )

bought 44,346 shares.

Shares of Trump Media ( DJT ) have been volatile, surging as much as

59% when they began trading on the Nasdaq on March 26. The rally

attracted short-sellers, who posted mark-to-market profits of

$91.1 million in April as shares tanked, according to S3

Partners. The stock has jumped 5% in May.

Trump Media ( DJT ) notified the Securities and Exchange Commission

on Wednesday of a delay in its quarterly filing because it

recently replaced an auditor that the regulator charged with

fraud. Shares fell nearly 1.7%.

The company reported an operating loss of $10.6 million for

the first nine months of 2023 on revenue of $3.4 million, and

currently has a market value of approximately $7 billion.

Firms including Shaolin Capital Management, Simplex Trading,

Picton Mahoney Asset Management and Radcliffe Capital Management

bought put options on the shares, which are typically bearish

bets that pay off if a share price goes down, according to

securities filings. It wasn't clear, however, if these were part

of a broader trading strategy.

Quarterly disclosures of hedge fund and other institutional

investors' stock holdings in 13F filings with the SEC are one of

the few public ways of tracking what hedge fund managers are

selling and buying. The disclosures are made 45 days after the

end of a quarter and may not reflect current positions.