Investment management company Curreen Capital released its fourth quarter 2024 Investor letter. A copy of the same can be downloaded here. In the fourth quarter, the fund returned 5.71% compared to 2.41% for the S&P 500 Index and -0.09% return for the MSCI World (US Gross). In 2024, the fund returned 7.72% underperforming 25.05% and 19.02% returns for the indexes. The firm believes that the underperformance in 2024 was affected by the same problems that affected the fund’s performance since late 2022. The stock market has taken longer time than the firm expected to acknowledge its undervalued ugly ducklings, despite the fact that the firm paid amazing prices and purchased excellent firms. In addition, you can check the fund’s top 5 holdings to determine its best picks for 2024.
Curreen Capital highlighted stocks like V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) in the Q4 2024 investor letter. Headquartered in Denver, Colorado, V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) designs, manufactures, and distributes branded lifestyle apparel, footwear, and related products. The one-month return of V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) was 17.73%, and its shares gained 47.72% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On January 23, 2024, V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) stock closed at $25.63 per share with a market capitalization of $9.978 billion.
Curreen Capital stated the following regarding V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“Since then, the S&P has gone up strongly, while the ugly ducklings that we bought have largely remained out of favor, for longer than I would have expected. We continue to implement our investment strategy, paying attractive prices for good businesses that are increasing their value. This should be rewarded in the stock market over time, but lately that process has been particularly slow and uneven.
As another example, I would have expected both V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC)and Advance Auto to have performed well last year, as the company’s situations are similar, and both made good progress on their turnarounds. In each case, the fundamentals are solid or improving, and I would have thought that they all would rise.
VF Corp manages apparel brands, including Dickies, The North Face, Timberland, and Vans. Under its prior CEO, the company’s poor capital allocation (including overpaying for Supreme and maintaining a too-high dividend after spinning out Kontoor) forced it to pause its model of using excess free cash flow to acquire good brands and manage them well. The company has now cut its dividend (twice) to a reasonable level and brought on a new CEO who has a track record of successfully turning around businesses. I believe that the company has good brands, the skills to manage them well, and a management team that is righting the ship. VF Corp currently trades at an attractive upside-to-downside ratio.”
A model walking down the runway wearing a fashionable and performance-based apparel designed by the company.
V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 30 hedge fund portfolios held V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) at the end of the third quarter which was 30 in the previous quarter. V.F. Corporation’s (NYSE:VFC) fiscal second quarter revenue was down 6% compared to prior year’s quarter, however, it met expectations with sequential growth and an improving gross margin. While we acknowledge the potential of V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) 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 V.F. Corporation (NYSE:VFC) and shared Upslope Capital Management’s views on the company. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q3 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.