Baron Funds, an investment management company, released its “Baron Fifth Avenue Growth Fund” first quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. The fund increased 12.6% (Institutional Shares) in the first quarter compared to an 11.4% gain for the Russell 1000 Growth Index and a 10.6% increase for the S&P 500 Index. Despite higher interest rates, the US economy continues to surpass expectations. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
Baron Fifth Avenue Growth Fund highlighted stocks like Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG), in the first quarter 2024 investor letter. Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG) owns and operate an e-commerce platform. The one-month return of Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG) was -2.44%, and its shares gained 42.09% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On May 24, 2024, Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG) stock closed at $22.35 per share with a market capitalization of $39.962 billion.
Baron Fifth Avenue Growth Fund stated the following regarding Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG) in its first quarter 2024 investor letter:
“We also added to our position in the Korean e-commerce platform, Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG), as the company continues to execute at a high level, reporting strong financial results, with accelerating revenue growth – revenues were up 20% year-over-year in constant currency in the fourth quarter, 29% excluding the impact from Coupang’s Fulfillment and Logistics accounting change, driven by growth in its number of customers count (up 16% year-over-year), growth of its loyalty Wow members (up 27% year-over-year) and growth in spending by existing cohorts (with every cohort, including those who have used the platform for a long time, growing at least 15% year-over-year), which suggests continued wallet share gains for the company. While Coupang continues to gain market share, its attractive unit economics are beginning to appear in results, with adjusted EBITDA margins of its commerce segment reaching 7.1% in the fourth quarter (up 190bps year-over-year). Coupang is utilizing the growing profits from commerce to invest in emerging offerings such as Fulfillment and Logistics by Coupang (FLC), expansion into Taiwan (with revenues up 2 times in the last six months) and Coupang Eats, its food delivery network, which saw order volume increase by 2 times as well in the last nine months. In the last week or so, Coupang also announced a material 58% Wow membership price hike, which should flow through nicely to the bottom line, sending the stock higher by close to 20%.”
A woman holding a laptop, wearing a graphic t-shirt, casually checking her e-commerce order.
Coupang, Inc. (NYSE: CPNG) had a strong first quarter in 2024. Total revenues increased by 28% in the quarter, or 23% excluding Farfetch. The increase in spending from the all the existing customer cohorts even the oldest was the main factor driving such a strong growth.
Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 66 hedge fund portfolios held Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG) at the end of the first quarter which was 53 in the previous quarter.
In another article, we discussed Coupang, Inc. (NYSE:CPNG) and shared the list of stocks that will 10x in 5 years according to analysts. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q1 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.
