Artisan Partners, an investment management company, released its “Artisan Small Cap Fund” fourth quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. US stocks concluded a strong year with strong gains in Q4. In Q4, the portfolio’s performance was flat and narrowly trailed the Russell 2000® Growth Index. In 2024, the portfolio produced a robust absolute return that was in line with the Russell 2000® Growth Index but outperformed the Russell 2000 Index. In the quarter, its Investor Class fund ARTSX returned 0.61%, Advisor Class fund APDSX posted a return of 0.66%, and Institutional Class fund APHSX returned 0.67%, compared to a return of 1.70% for the Russell 2000 Growth Index. In addition, you can check the fund’s top 5 holdings to find out its best picks for 2024.
In its fourth quarter 2024 investor letter, Artisan Small Cap Fund emphasized stocks such as JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM). John Bean Technologies Corporation was renamed JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) in January 2025. JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) offers technology solutions to food and beverage industry. The one-month return of JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) was -0.58%, and its shares gained 24.45% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On March 10, 2025, JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) stock closed at $127.60 per share with a market capitalization of $6.62 billion.
Artisan Small Cap Fund stated the following regarding JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“Notable adds in the quarter included JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM), Parsons and Gitlab. John Bean Technologies is a leading global technology solutions provider to high-value segments of the food and beverage industry. Given our rising confidence in its Marel acquisition, which brings together two leaders in the production of manufacturing equipment for processing protein, we added to our position. We believe this combination can benefit from typical cost synergies along with an infusion of the company’s lean manufacturing and operating discipline into the Marel culture and asset base.”
A close-up of a technician mixing ingredients in a large food processing factory.
JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 23 hedge fund portfolios held JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) at the end of the fourth quarter compared to 19 in the third quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of JBT Marel Corporation (NYSE:JBTM) 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 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.