Baron Funds, an investment management company, released its “Baron Health Care Fund” fourth quarter 2023 investor letter. A copy of the same can be downloaded here. The fund advanced 7.69% (Institutional Shares) in the quarter compared to a 6.96% gain for the Russell 3000 Health Care Index and an 11.69% increase for the S&P 500 Index. For the full year, the fund increased 6.42%, compared to 2.87% and 26.29% returns for the indexes, respectively. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2023.
Baron Health Care Fund featured stocks such as Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) in the third quarter 2023 investor letter. Headquartered in Brentwood, Tennessee, Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) owns and operates a network of surgical facilities and ancillary service. On January 19, 2024, Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) stock closed at $32.09 per share. One-month return of Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) was -0.43%, and its shares lost 5.62% of their value over the last 52 weeks. Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) has a market capitalization of $4.059 billion.
Baron Health Care Fund stated the following regarding Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) in its fourth quarter 2023 investor letter:
“We established a small position in Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY), a leading operator of ambulatory surgery centers in the U.S. Like Stryker, the stock sold off during the quarter due to concerns about the impact of GLP-1s on its business, and we felt the sell-off offered a buying opportunity. The company, which operates primarily majority owned centers in partnership with physicians or hospital systems, is benefiting from a multi-year trend of surgical procedures migrating from inpatient to outpatient settings, facilitated by advances in medicine, payors’ push towards lower cost outpatient facilities and patient/physician preference and convenience. The company’s solid organic revenue growth profile has multiple drivers, including the mix shift to higher acuity, higher cost orthopedic and cardiac procedures, volume growth from additional physician recruitment and expanded medical specialties and better payor contracting. On top of this organic growth, management intends to deploy $200 million annually for acquisitions, leading to mid-teens EBITDA growth. We believe the stock can compound for many years as the company executes on its plan.”
An orthopedic surgeon performing a surgery while using ankle plating systems.
Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 15 hedge fund portfolios held Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY)at the end of third quarter which was 23 in the previous quarter.
We discussed Surgery Partners, Inc. (NASDAQ:SGRY) in another article and shared ClearBridge Select Strategy’s views on the company in the previous quarter. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q4 2023 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.
