Appleseed Fund, an investment management company released its second quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the same can be downloaded here. The fund’s Investor Class generated an absolute return of 17.36% over the 6 months that ended March 31, 2024, compared to the Morningstar Global Small/Midcap Index’s 18.46% return. Appleseed Fund was positioned for an inflationary, slow-growth environment for most of the previous year. The cautious position of the Appleseed Fund prevented investment gains even while inflation levels have been lowering and the stock market has been raging since the end of 2022. In addition, Appleseed’s lack of exposure to Magnificent Seven limited returns. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
Appleseed Fund highlighted stocks like Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM), in the second quarter 2024 investor letter. Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) offers medical and specialty insurance products. Humana Inc.’s (NYSE:HUM) one-month return was 4.50%, and its shares lost 15.92% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On July 8, 2024, Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) stock closed at $370.43 per share with a market capitalization of $44.167 billion.
Appleseed Fund stated the following regarding Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) in its Q2 2024 investor letter:
“Appleseed Fund added three new names to the portfolio in the past six months: Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM), AGNC Investment Corp. (AGNC), and Cameco Corporation (CCJ). Humana is one of several U.S. large managed care organizations and is primarily focused on government health insurance. Humana’s share price has fallen over 40.0% from post-COVID highs due to the recent emergence of elevated medical loss ratios. In our view, Humana’s stock has been severely punished and the stock was quite attractive at the time when Appleseed Fund took a position.”
A closeup of an elderly patient happily receiving a specialty healthcare product.
Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 74 hedge fund portfolios held Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) at the end of the first quarter which was 86 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) 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.
We discussed Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) in another article and shared the list of largest companies in the US. In its Q1 2024 investor letter, Artisan Value Fund expressed a positive outlook for Humana Inc. (NYSE:HUM) and added it in its portfolio. 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.
