Ariel Investments, an investment management company, released its “Ariel Global Fund” fourth-quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. In 2024, global markets surpassed expectations, driven by U.S. tech companies and AI-themed stocks. However, Eurozone challenges, uncertainty over interest rates, and a strengthening U.S. dollar impacted MSCI ACWI and EAFE Indices. Against this backdrop, the Ariel Global fund traded -3.66% lower compared to the -0.99% return of its primary benchmark, the MSCI ACWI Index, and -4.71% return of its secondary benchmark, the MSCI ACWI Value Index. The fund returned +7.14% over the trailing one-year period compared to +17.49% and +10.76% returns for the indexes. Ariel follows a non-consensus approach to identify undervalued, out-of-favor franchises that are misunderstood and mispriced. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
In its fourth quarter 2024 investor letter, Ariel Global Fund emphasized stocks such as AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV). AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) is a research-based biopharmaceutical company. The one-month return of AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) was 11.33%, and its shares gained 18.04% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On March 3, 2025, AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) stock closed at $211.48 per share with a market capitalization of $373.336 billion.
Ariel Global Fund stated the following regarding AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“We added research-based biopharmaceutical company, AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) following a recent pullback in shares related to a Phase 2 clinical failure for schizophrenia drug, Emraclidine. Despite the setback, we believe AbbVie’s core inflammation and immunology (I&I) business is set to outperform. We expect next-generation I&I drugs, Skyrizi and Rinvoq, used in the treatment of inflammatory bowel disease, to be key long-term revenue drivers.”
A pharmacist handing out a pharmaceutical drug to a patient in a drug store or chemist.
AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 85 hedge fund portfolios held AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) at the end of the fourth quarter compared to 68 in the third quarter. AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) reported full-year adjusted earnings per share of $10.12, which is $0.49 above the initial guidance midpoint. While we acknowledge the potential of AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is as promising as NVIDIA but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
In another article, we discussed AbbVie Inc. (NYSE:ABBV) and shared the list of most undervalued long-term stocks to buy. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q4 2024 page for more investor letters from hedge funds and other leading investors.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.