Investment management company Vulcan Value Partners recently released its fourth-quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. In 2024, the US economy was stronger than expected; the large-cap stocks led the robust U.S. equities markets. Although it is still excessively high, inflation did decrease throughout the course of the year. The largest market cap U.S. Companies performed better than the whole market. Lastly, U.S. stocks outperformed the majority of equities in non-U.S. markets. During Q4 and 2024, Focus and Focus Plus were the best performing strategies while Small Cap was the worst performing. However, all strategies had positive returns for the year. In the quarter, the Large Cap Composite returned -0.1% net of fees and expenses, the Small Cap Composite returned -7.3% net, the Focus Composite returned 6.3% net, the Focus Plus composite returned 7.4% and the All-Cap Composite returned -2.5% net. For more information on the fund’s best picks in 2024, please check its top five holdings.
Vulcan Value Partners highlighted stocks like Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) in Q4 quarter 2024 investor letter. Headquartered in Yardley, Pennsylvania, Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) engages in the packaging business. The one-month return of Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) was 3.02%, and its shares lost 5.60% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On January 17, 2025, Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) stock closed at $85.56 per share with a market capitalization of $10.236 billion.
Vulcan Value Partners stated the following regarding Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“We purchased six new positions during the quarter: Sodexo SA, Crown Holdings Inc., Heineken NV, Rentokil Initial plc, Pernod Ricard SA, and UnitedHealth Group Inc. Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) is the second largest manufacturer of aluminum beverage cans globally. The beverage can industry is a consolidated and rational industry with high barriers to entry. The industry structure, scale, and long-term contracts with inflationary pass-throughs result in solid and stable margins, high returns on capital and robust free cash flow. While inflation has been a slight headwind, volumes are growing as aluminum cans are taking share from other substrates, most notably plastic, as aluminum is considered a better, more sustainable product. Additionally, through free cash flow generation and the proceeds from the sale of a minority investment, Crown has de-levered, putting the company in a position to buy back shares at a discount to our estimate of intrinsic value.”
A closeup shot of a large industrial machine that manufactures steel cans.
Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 43 hedge fund portfolios held Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) at the end of the third quarter which was 48 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) 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 another article, we discussed Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) and shared the list of stocks surging on analyst recommendations. Middle Coast Investing highlighted Crown Holdings, Inc. (NYSE:CCK) in its Q4 2024 investor letter. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q4 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.