Mar Vista Investment Partners, LLC, an investment management company, released the “Mar Vista Global Quality Strategy” fourth quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. As investors welcomed reduced interest rates and inflation in developed economies, the global stock market rose in 2024. The MSCI World Net Index increased 18.7% for the year, finishing an incredible two-year run with a 47% total return and its second straight annual gain above 15%. In the fourth quarter, the strategy returned -3.31% net-of-fees compared to -0.16% and -0.99% returns for the MSCI World Net Index and the MSCI All Country World Net Index, respectively. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
In its fourth quarter 2024 investor letter, Mar Vista Global Quality Strategy emphasized stocks such as ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML). ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) is an advanced semiconductor equipment systems manufacturer for chipmakers. The one-month return of ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) was 6.82%, and its shares lost 22.20% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On February 21, 2025, ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) stock closed at $737.21 per share with a market capitalization of $290.854 billion.
Mar Vista Global Quality Strategy stated the following regarding ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“During the quarter, we established a new position in ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML). We initiated a position in ASML Holdings (ASML) due to its unmatched leadership in semiconductor lithography equipment and its pivotal role in enabling the next generation of chip production. ASML’s extreme ultraviolet (EUV) technology remains unrivaled in the industry, leading to dominate market share and strong customer relationships with leading foundries like TSMC & Samsung. ASML’s wide economic moat is derived from its proprietary technology in the lithography market where its product offering is required to manufacture the most advanced semiconductors. We believe this monopoly like position should allow ASML to generate consistent long-term growth at very high returns.
ASML’s stock came under pressure after management provided a softer-than-expected 2025 outlook, which created a favorable risk-reward, in our opinion. We believe the issues driving the softer than expected 2025 outlook are transitory and continue to expect ASML to benefit from growing demand for advanced semiconductors that are critical to power artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and mobile devices. We expect ASML will compound intrinsic value high-teens as semiconductor device manufacturers continue to development more advanced and energy efficient semiconductors which rely on ASML’s mission critical technology platform.”
A technician in a clean room working on a semiconductor device, illuminated by the machines.
ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 86 hedge fund portfolios held ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) at the end of the fourth quarter compared to 64 in the third quarter. ASML Holding N.V.’s (NASDAQ:ASML) total net sales in the fourth quarter reached €9.3 billion, which was above the high end of guidance. While we acknowledge the potential of ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) 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 ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML) and shared the list of best global stocks to buy according to hedge funds. 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.