ClearBridge Investments, an investment management firm, published its “Select Strategy” first quarter 2021 investor letter – a copy of which can be downloaded here. The ClearBridge Select Strategy slightly underperformed its Russell 3000 Index benchmark in the first quarter. On an absolute basis, the Strategy had gains across nine of the 10 sectors in which it was invested during the quarter (out of 11 sectors total) You can view the fund’s top 5 holdings to have a peek at their top bets for 2021.
ClearBridge Investments, in its Q1 2021 investor letter, mentioned MSC Industrial Direct Co., Inc. (NYSE: MSM), and shared their insights on the company. MSC Industrial Direct Co., Inc. is a Melville, New York-based industrial supplies company that currently has a $5.1 billion market capitalization. Since the beginning of the year, MSM delivered a 9.84% return, extending its 12-month gains to 24.92%. As of June 04, 2021, the stock closed at $92.69 per share.
Here is what ClearBridge Investments has to say about MSC Industrial Direct Co., Inc. in its Q1 2021 investor letter:
“MSC Industrial Direct was another significant addition during the quarter. Management moves to improve margins and cash flow had the distributor of industrials parts and equipment poised for better performance leading into COVID, but the company was severely impacted by the closing of the economy. In a fragmented market, MSC has the ability to flex its supply chain to win market share as the business cycle picks up.”
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Our calculations show that MSC Industrial Direct Co., Inc. (NYSE: MSM) does not belong in our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As of the end of the first quarter of 2021, MSC Industrial Direct Co., Inc. was in 20 hedge fund portfolios, compared to 18 funds in the fourth quarter of 2020. MSM delivered an 8.59% return in the past 3 months.
The top 10 stocks among hedge funds returned 231.2% between 2015 and 2020, and outperformed the S&P 500 Index ETFs by more than 126 percentage points. We know it sounds unbelievable. You have been dismissing our articles about top hedge fund stocks mostly because you were fed biased information by other media outlets about hedge funds’ poor performance. You could have doubled the size of your nest egg by investing in the top hedge fund stocks instead of dumb S&P 500 ETFs. Here you can watch our video about the top 5 hedge fund stocks right now. All of these stocks had positive returns in 2020.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
