Baron Funds, an asset management firm, published its “Baron Health Care Fund” second quarter 2022 investor letter – a copy of which can be downloaded here. In the quarter ended June 30, 2022, Baron Health Care Fund (the “Fund”) declined 10.00% (Institutional Shares), compared with the 7.43% decline for the Russell 3000 Health Care Index (the “Benchmark”) and the 16.10% decline for the S&P 500 Index. Since its inception (April 30, 2018), the Fund increased 15.00% on an annualized basis compared with the 11.96% gain for the Benchmark and the 10.91% gain for the S&P 500 Index. Go over the fund’s top 5 positions to have a glimpse of its finest picks for 2022.
In its Q2 2022 investor letter, Baron Health Care Fund mentioned Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) and explained its insights for the company. Founded in 1998, Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) is a San Diego, California-based biotechnology company with a $34.5 billion market capitalization. Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) delivered a -42.22% return since the beginning of the year, while its 12-month returns are down by -57.96%. The stock closed at $219.83 per share on August 16, 2022.
Here is what Baron Health Care Fund has to say about Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) in its Q2 2022 investor letter:
“We added to Illumina, Inc., the leading provider of next generation DNA sequencing technologies for genetic analysis. The stock declined to multiyear lows due to investor concerns about increased competition. Although we expect some market share erosion, we think it will be difficult for competitors to overcome Illumina’s dominant market position particularly in clinical and biopharmaceutical markets where Illumina is entrenched in validated customer workflows. In addition, we expect Illumina to continue to innovate and introduce new products.
Historically, Illumina has been adept at staying one step ahead of the competition, and the company is planning to introduce, among other new products, a new chemistry (Chemistry X) that would bring down sequencing prices while increasing speed and accuracy. At its current valuation, we think the market is underestimating Illumina’s growth potential as the applications for DNA sequencing continue to expand in areas like oncology, reproductive health, genetic disease, infectious disease, drug discovery and proteomics.”
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Our calculations show that Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) fell short and didn’t make it on our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) was in 54 hedge fund portfolios at the end of the second quarter of 2022, compared to 53 funds in the previous quarter. Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) delivered a -9.62% return in the past 3 months.
In July 2022, we also shared another hedge fund’s views on Illumina, Inc. (NASDAQ:ILMN) in another article. You can find other investor letters from hedge funds and prominent investors on our hedge fund investor letters 2022 Q2 page.
Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
