Is it a Smart Choice to Invest in Hartford Financial (HIG)?

ClearBridge Investments, an investment management firm, published its “Mid Cap Strategy” third quarter 2021 investor letter – a copy of which can be downloaded here. The ClearBridge Mid Cap Strategy outperformed its Russell Midcap Index during the third quarter. On an absolute basis, the Strategy had gains across eight of the 11 sectors in which it was invested during the quarter. The leading contributors were the health care and financials sectors while consumer discretionary was the primary detractor. You can take a look at the fund’s top 5 holdings to have an idea about their best picks for 2021.

ClearBridge Mid Cap Strategy, in its Q3 2021 investor letter, mentioned The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. (NYSE: HIG) and discussed its stance on the firm. The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. is a Hartford, Connecticut-based financial services company with a $24.1 billion market capitalization. HIG delivered a 2.59% return since the beginning of the year, while its 12-month returns are up by 47.65%. The stock closed at $70.83 per share on January 04, 2022.

Here is what ClearBridge Mid Cap Strategy has to say about The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc.  in its Q3 2021 investor letter:

“Financials continued to gain from the economic recovery from COVID-19. Insurance companies, such as Hartford Financial Services Group, benefited from rate increases and margin improvements during the quarter, as well as historically high retention and premium growth driving an improvement in ROE.”

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Based on our calculations, The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. (NYSE: HIG) was not able to clinch a spot in our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. HIG was in 34 hedge fund portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2021, compared to 43 funds in the previous quarter. The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. (NYSE: HIG) delivered a -1.24% return in the past 3 months.

In June 2021, we also shared another hedge fund’s views on HIG in another article. You can find more than 100 investor letters from hedge funds and prominent investors on our hedge fund investor letters 2021 Q3 page.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.