By Svea Herbst-Bayliss

NEW YORK (Reuters) -Barington Capital Group, which lost a high-profile board fight at Matthews International this year, increased its holding in the casket maker but also liquidated its bet on toymaker Mattel where it was also pushing for changes, a new filing shows.

The so-called 13-F filing shows that Barington, which fought for three seats on the Matthews' board, increased the size of its investment by roughly 40% to 798,617 shares during the first three months of the year.

Barington criticized the company's underperformance and pressed it to replace its chief executive and consider some divestments, but it lost the proxy fight in late February when investors re-elected all of management's candidates.

However, rather than sell some or all of the shares, something that often happens when investors lose proxy battles, Barington did the opposite and bought more Matthews shares. The stock price has fallen 23% this year.

A representative for Barington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Also during the first quarter, Barington sold out of its investment in Mattel after having pushed the company to consider selling its Fisher-Price and American Girl units, buying back more stock and rethinking its compensation plans, all to help push the stock price higher.

By the end of March, Barington had sold its remaining 525,100 shares to exit the position. It had already sold 50,000 shares during the fourth quarter of 2024, filings show.

Mattel, which owns Barbie and Matchbox brands, said earlier in May that it plans to raise prices on some toys to offset the impact of tariffs on Chinese imports. It also said that it is keeping its $600 million share repurchase target for this year.

The 13-F filings, which detail what investment firms owned in U.S. stocks at the end of the previous quarter, are backward-looking but are closely watched for indications of investment trends.

(Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss; editing by Diane Craft)