By Carolina Mandl

NEW YORK (Reuters) – Global hedge funds this week bought U.S. information technology stocks, such as semiconductors and hardware, at the fastest in five months amid the start of the third-quarter earnings season, according to Goldman Sachs on Friday.

Outside the U.S., diverging reports from chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing and chipmaking equipment supplier ASML Holding moved shares in opposite directions while investors await semiconductor companies such as Advanced Micro Devices and Nvidia to unveil their earnings as they seek a trend.

Goldman Sachs’ prime brokerage unit, which provides services for hedge funds and tracks their positioning, said portfolio managers net bought U.S. information technology stocks for the third straight week. Hedge funds both covered short positions – bets stocks will fall – and snapped up long positions.

The bank said the only information tech subsector hedge funds sold was software.

Overall, information technology accounts for 16.1% of hedge funds’ U.S. exposure, down from roughly 22% it reached earlier this year.

On the flip side, hedge funds sold stocks in U.S. consumer sectors, from food products to beverages and restaurants for the fifth straight week, the bank said.

(Reporting by Carolina Mandl, in New York; Editing by Marguerita Choy)