Oakmark Funds, advised by Harris Associates, released its “Oakmark International Fund” fourth quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. For the quarter ended December 31, 2024, the fund returned -8.48% compared to the MSCI World ex USA Index’s -7.43% return. Since its inception, the fund returned 8.19% compared to a 5.92% return for the index. Communication services contributed to the fund’s performance in the quarter while health care and financials detracted. In addition, you can check the fund’s top 5 holdings to determine its best picks for 2024.
Oakmark International Fund highlighted stocks like KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) in the fourth quarter 2024 investor letter. KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) is a Korea-based financial company that provides banking and related financial services to consumers and corporations. The one-month return of KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) was 4.75%, and its shares gained 66.14% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On January 14, 2025, KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) stock closed at $61.14 per share with a market capitalization of $22.896 billion.
Oakmark International Fund stated the following regarding KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) is a leading South Korean bank that provides a range of financial products and services, including retail banking, corporate banking, wealth management and international banking services. Korean banks have a history generating uninspiring returns on equity and low payout ratios (POR), and despite recent geopolitical uncertainty, there is broad support for the government’s value up program, which aims to address these issues by encouraging better corporate governance, transparency and improved capital efficiency. As South Korea’s largest bank, KB Financial possesses the industry’s strongest capital position, a renowned low cost deposit franchise and leading fee income, which we believe advantageously positions the company to lead the now improving banking industry in both the speed and magnitude of improvements to POR. In addition, we appreciate management’s focus on shareholder return because the anticipated growth in dividends and buybacks provides downside protection if the multiple expansion portion of the thesis sputters. Despite this compelling set-up, we were excited to purchase shares at an attractive valuation for a bank commonly acknowledged as the best bank in South Korea, per our channel checks.”
A business executive analyzing their latest financial performance figures, thanks to the company’s online cash management services.
KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 16 hedge fund portfolios held KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) at the end of the third quarter which was 14 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) 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 KB Financial Group Inc. (NYSE:KB) and shared the list of ridiculously cheap 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.
READ NEXT: Michael Burry Is Selling These Stocks and A New Dawn Is Coming to US Stocks.
Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.