RAM Smid Composite’s Top gainer: Lifeway Foods (LWAY)

Rewey Asset Management, an investment management company, released its “RAM Smid Composite” third quarter investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. The fund rose 9.83% in 3Q24 and 18.53% year-to-date, outperforming the benchmark, the Russell 2500 Value index, which gained 9.63% in 3Q24 and up 11.27% YTD. The firm constructed its portfolio based on a three-pronged investment philosophy—financial strength, the ability to grow, and discounted valuations. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.

Rewey Asset Management highlighted stocks like Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) in the third quarter 2024 investor letter. Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) is a probiotic-based products distributor. The one-month return of Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) was 0.08%, and its shares gained 103.75% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On December 13, 2024, Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) stock closed at $24.45 per share with a market capitalization of $362.26 million.

Rewey Asset Management stated the following regarding Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) in its Q3 2024 investor letter:

“Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) was our top percentage gainer in the quarter, up an astounding 103%! We often write about how the power of investing in neglect is equally important to investing in low valuations, and LWAY demonstrated this point in 3Q24. We purchased LWAY in 2Q24 as shares sold off despite a strong quarter that demonstrated continued revenue growth and margin expansion, despite a slight ‘miss’ to street EPS estimates. In our view, there was nothing bad about 2Q24, other than inaccurate sell side models. On August 13th, LWAY blew away these low expectations with a strong FY3Q report, where revenues grew over 25%, surpassing $50 million in a quarter for the first time. Shares further surged on Sept 23rd, when Danone, the global dairy company that owns 23.36% of the company, made an unsolicited bid for the company at $25 per share. While we think a deal may eventually get done, we think this first offer of $25 is too low.”

A close-up of a glass bottle of kefir, revealing its probiotic-based properties.

Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 18 hedge fund portfolios held Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) at the end of the third quarter which was 10 in the previous quarter. Lifeway Foods, Inc.’s (NASDAQ:LWAY) sales were $46.1 million in the third quarter 2024, an increase of 12.7% compared to Q3 2023. While we acknowledge the potential of Lifeway Foods, Inc. (NASDAQ:LWAY) 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 addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q3 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.