Wedgewood Partners, an investment management company, released its fourth quarter 2023 investor letter. A copy of the same can be downloaded here. In the fourth quarter, Wedgewood Composite’s net return was 11.4% compared to the Standard & Poor’s 11.7%, Russell 1000 Growth Index’s 14.2%, and Russell 1000 Value Index’s 9.5% return for the same period. Year-to-date, the fund returned 29.2% compared to 26.3%, 42.7%, and 11.5%, respectively for the indexes. In addition, you can check the top 5 holdings of the fund to know its best picks in 2023.
Wedgewood Partners featured stocks such as O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) in the fourth quarter 2023 investor letter. Headquartered in Springfield, Missouri, O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) is an automotive parts, tools, and supplies retailer. On January 12, 2024, O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) stock closed at $953.06 per share. One-month return of O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) was 0.16%, and its shares gained 16.87% of their value over the last 52 weeks. O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) has a market capitalization of $56.399 billion.
Wedgewood Partners stated the following regarding O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) in its fourth quarter 2023 investor letter:
“O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) was also a bottom contributor to portfolio performance. The Company reported +11% sales growth for the quarter, driven by a +17% increase in sales to professional service providers, leading to +12% growth in operating income and +17% increase in earnings per share. The Company – true to its long capital allocation culture – has aggressively bought back shares over the past 12 months. O’Reilly Automotive’s professional sales segment continues to dramatically outpace its publicly traded competitors. The Company has a mostly singular focus on the United States, whereas several of its competitors have diverted their attention away from the large and fragmented U.S. professional market, toward non-U.S. or non-automotive markets. In the short-term, investors are focused on the mild weather that has unfolded during the late fall and early winter of 2023. Mild weather often leads to temporary slowdowns in sales growth for auto parts, but we would look to take advantage of that because O’Reilly’s long-term competitive positioning and extraordinary returns on capital are well-entrenched.”
A mechanic working in a busy automotive service station, attended by customers.
O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 45 hedge fund portfolios held O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) at the end of third quarter which was 52 in the previous quarter.
We discussed O’Reilly Automotive, Inc. (NASDAQ:ORLY) in another article and shared TimesSquare Capital’s views on the company in the previous quarter. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q4 2023 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.