Artisan Partners, an investment management company, released its “Artisan Value Income Fund” fourth quarter 2022 investor letter. A copy of the same can be downloaded here. In the fourth quarter, its Investor Class fund APFWX returned 10.25%, Advisor Class fund APDWX posted a return of 10.23%, and Institutional Class fund APHWX returned 10.24%, compared to a return of 7.56% for the S&P 500 Index. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2022.
Artisan Value Income Fund highlighted stocks like Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) in the Q4 2022 investor letter. Headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) is a tobacco company. On April 5, 2023, Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) stock closed at $98.74 per share. One-month return of Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) was -1.01%, and its shares lost 0.28% of their value over the last 52 weeks. Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) has a market capitalization of $153.259 billion.
Artisan Value Income Fund made the following comment about Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) in its Q4 2022 investor letter:
“Our top individual contributors were Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM), EOG Resources and Merck. Despite being US-based, tobacco company PM derives all its sales from outside the US. As a result, foreign exchange impacts can be an important driver of near-term returns, and the recent weakening in the US dollar should provide a strong tailwind for earnings due to translation effects. However, our investment case is not tied to currency movements. By virtue of its globally known brands, PM is the best-in-class operator with a well-diversified business, particularly by geography. We believe its next generation heat-not-burn product IQOS should gain share as consumers continue migrating to safer tobacco delivery systems. The company is progressing toward its acquisition of Swedish Match, a Swedish tobacco and nicotine products maker, which was previously held in the portfolio. The deal is a good fit for PM as it reduces PM’s dependence on cigarettes—a category in steady decline—and accelerates the company’s transition to smokeless “reduced-risk” products (RRPs)—a category that has experienced rapid growth over the past five years. PM can also leverage its global scale to generate significant revenue synergies from these complementary product sets, as well as quickly gain access to the US market—the world’s largest market for RRPs and one where regulators have embraced RRPs and other less harmful nicotine products. Looking at PM through our margin-of-safety criteria, the business trades for an undemanding valuation and has extraordinary business economics and a strong credit profile.”
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Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 47 hedge fund portfolios held Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) at the end of the fourth quarter which was 63 in the previous quarter.
We discussed Philip Morris International Inc. (NYSE:PM) in another article and shared the list of best counter cyclical stocks to buy. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q4 2022 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.