ClearBridge Investments, an investment management company, released its “ClearBridge Small Cap Value Strategy” second quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. Despite strong performance from healthcare holdings, the Strategy lagged its benchmark, the Russell 2000 Value Index, due to headwinds in the materials and industrial sectors. While investors continued to focus on a limited number of AI beneficiaries and bitcoin plays, the rest of the market was hit by the economic slowdown and a higher-for-longer interest rate expectation. This made the second quarter particularly difficult to navigate for small-cap stocks. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
ClearBridge Small Cap Value Strategy highlighted stocks like Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP), in the second quarter 2024 investor letter. Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) is a heavy construction material and light building materials supplier. The one-month return of Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) was 12.51%, and its shares gained 76.86% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On September 23, 2024, Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) stock closed at $287.94 per share with a market capitalization of $9.68 billion.
ClearBridge Small Cap Value Strategy stated the following regarding Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) in its Q2 2024 investor letter:
“Stock selection in the materials sector weighed on relative performance. Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP), last quarter’s top-performing holding, pulled back as macro uncertainty and higher-for-longer interest rates resulted in weaker industrial and construction outlooks. However, we continue to have high conviction that the company’s strong pricing power in its cement business and cost advantages versus its peers in its wallboard business should allow Eagle to continue to maintain attractive returns on capital.”
A construction site with heavy equipment and people in hard hats working on the next infrastructure project.
Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 28 hedge fund portfolios held Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) at the end of the second quarter which was 30 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) 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 Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) and shared Jim Cramer’s stock picks you need to know. Eagle Materials Inc. (NYSE:EXP) was a top individual contributor of ClearBridge Small Cap Value Strategy in Q1 2024. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q2 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.