Meridian Funds, managed by ArrowMark Partners, released its “Meridian Hedged Equity Fund” second quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. In the quarter, the fund appreciated 0.92% (net), trailing its benchmark, the S&P 500 Index, which returned 4.28%. Also, the Fund lagged behind its secondary benchmark, the CBOE S&P 500 Buy/Write Index’s 1.49% return. The firm’s approach puts controlling negative risks ahead of pursuing excessive profits. It anticipates that capital preservation in bear markets will eventually play a significant role in the long-term compounding of returns. In addition, you can check the fund’s top 5 holdings to determine its best picks for 2024.
Meridian Hedged Equity Fund highlighted stocks like Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN), in the second quarter 2024 investor letter. Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) designs, develops, manufactures, and sells electric vehicles and accessories. The one-month return of Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) was -17.75%, and its shares lost 46.50% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On September 23, 2024, Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) stock closed at $11.91 per share with a market capitalization of $12.008 billion.
Meridian Hedged Equity Fund stated the following regarding Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) in its Q2 2024 investor letter:
“Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) is a US-based electric vehicle manufacturer focused on the design, development, and production of electric adventure vehicles, pickup trucks, and commercial delivery vans. We own Rivian because we believe the company is a future leader in the growing electric vehicle market with a strong brand, compelling products, and a vertically integrated business model. During the quarter, Rivian’s stock price was driven by its progress on cost reduction initiatives and management’s stated confidence in achieving positive gross margins by the end of 2024. The recent announcement of a joint venture with Volkswagen, involving up to $5 billion in investment, also significantly boosted Rivian’s financing outlook and validated its technology. We trimmed our position in Rivian given the strong performance in the quarter.”
A state-of-the-art electric vehicle charging at a station at a suburban mall.
Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 37 hedge fund portfolios held Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) at the end of the second quarter which was 26 in the previous quarter. Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) generated $1.2 billion of revenues in the second quarter. The Q2 production was impacted by plant downtime. While we acknowledge the potential of Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) 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 Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) and shared the list of stocks from Jim Cramer’s latest portfolio to Watch in September. Rivian Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:RIVN) detracted from the performance of Meridian Hedged Equity Fund in Q1 2024, due to lower demand and higher interest rate. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q2 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.