ClearBridge Investments, an investment management company, released its “ClearBridge Mid Cap Strategy” first quarter 2025 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. Though initially positive, stories on possible tariffs, global trade conflict, and a rotation out of AI-related tech firms sent equities lower in the first quarter. In this environment, the ClearBridge Mid Cap Strategy underperformed the benchmark, Russell Midcap Index in the quarter, due to idiosyncratic headwinds, strengthened by the market volatility; put pressure on several of strategy’s technology and industrial holdings. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2025.
In its first quarter 2025 investor letter, ClearBridge Mid Cap Strategy emphasized stocks such as Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP). Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) manufactures and distributes smart, connected, and secure embedded control solutions. The one-month return of Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) was -27.46%, and its shares lost 54.68% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On April 10, 2025, Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) stock closed at $38.81 per share with a market capitalization of $20.873 billion.
ClearBridge Mid Cap Strategy stated the following regarding Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) in its Q1 2025 investor letter:
“Also within the IT sector, we added Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP), which supplies analog and mixed-signal microprocessors for use in the automotive, industrial, computing and other industries. We took advantage of recent weakness in the stock to add to the position. We believe that the return of the company’s prior CEO and efforts to rebuild relationships with customers has resulted in Microchip recovering market share to prior levels, and that it represents an attractive cyclical improvement story with asset optimization improvements and good business visibility.”
A semiconductor wafer at various stages of fabrication, showing the company’s range of expertise.
Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 44 hedge fund portfolios held Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) at the end of the fourth quarter compared to 37 in the third quarter. Microchip Technology Incorporated’s (NASDAQ:MCHP) net sales in the December quarter were $1.026 billion, down 11.8% sequentially and down 41.9% from Q4 2023. While we acknowledge the potential of Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) 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 covered Microchip Technology Incorporated (NASDAQ:MCHP) in another article, where we shared the list of best data center stocks to buy according to billionaires. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q1 2025 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.
