Artisan Partners, an investment management company, released its “Artisan Global Equity Fund” first quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. The expectation of rate reduction later this year and slowing inflation boosted global markets in Q1. In the first quarter, the fund’s Investor Class ARTHX returned 12.67 %, Advisor Class APDHX posted a return of 12.67%, and Institutional Class APHHX returned 12.72%, compared to an 8.20% return for the MSCI All Country World Index. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
Artisan Global Equity Fund highlighted stocks like Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO), in the Q1 2024 investor letter. Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) engages in the research and development, manufacture, and distribution of pharmaceutical products. The one-month return of Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) was 2.19%, and its shares gained 79.36% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On July 2, 2024, Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) stock closed at $142.98 per share with a market capitalization of $636.88 billion.
Artisan Global Equity Fund stated the following regarding Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) in its Q1 2024 investor letter:
“In addition, shares of Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) rose after it reported phase 1 clinical trial results for its new experimental obesity drug Amycretin, a single molecule that operates as a GLP-1 receptor agonist, reducing one’s appetite. The new oral treatment achieved a 13.1% average weight loss after 12 weeks, more than doubling the efficacy of Wegovy for the same time span. This result also bested Lilly’s Orfoglipron, another experimental drug that achieved 5%–6% average weight loss earlier in its trials. While the Amycretin data are preliminary, investors were encouraged by the prospects of Novo Nordisk solidifying a best-in-class obesity designation, a desirable status given rising competition. In our view, Novo Nordisk has the best obesity/Type 2 diabetes pipeline in the industry, which should help protect this franchise from competition over the next 10 years.”
An elderly couple receiving insulin from a pharmacist, representing healthcare company’s successful pharmaceutical products.
Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 60 hedge fund portfolios held Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) at the end of the first quarter which was 58 in the previous quarter. Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) delivered 24% sales growth and 30% operating profit growth in the first quarter 2024. While we acknowledge the potential of Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) 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.
We discussed Novo Nordisk A/S (NYSE:NVO) in another article and shared billionaire George Soros’s favorite weight loss stock. 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.