Ariel Investments, an investment management company, released its “Ariel Focus Fund” third-quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. Due to the economy’s resilience and forecasters’ expectations of a soft landing, all major U.S. indices enjoyed gains in the third quarter. In the third quarter, the fund returned +10.61%, outperforming the +9.43% return for the Russell 1000 Value Index and the +5.89% return for the S&P 500 Index. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
Ariel Focus Fund highlighted stocks like APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA), in the third quarter 2024 investor letter. APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) engages in oil and natural exploration, development, and production. The one-month return of APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) was -11.81%, and its shares lost 41.38% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On November 12, 2024, APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) stock closed at $21.87 per share with a market capitalization of $8.091 billion.
Ariel Focus Fund stated the following regarding APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) in its Q3 2024 investor letter:
“In contrast, oil and natural gas explorer, APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) was the greatest detractor from relative performance in the quarter amid weakness in energy prices driven by concerns of slowing global growth. Although the company delivered solid earnings, conservative production guidance due to curtailments in the Permian Basin and higher than expected North Sea maintenance weighed on shares. Also in the quarter, APA announced the successful sale of its non-core asset, the Central Basin Platform as well as raised synergy targets for the Callon Petroleum Company acquisition. APA remains laser-focused on increasing the operational efficiency of the Callon assets, free cash flow generation and returning capital to shareholders.”
Workers in hard hats and safety gear processing oil and gas in a US refinery.
APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 31 hedge fund portfolios held APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) at the end of the second quarter which was 45 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) 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 APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) and shared the list of oversold energy stocks to buy. APA Corporation (NASDAQ:APA) detracted from the performance of Ariel Focus Fund in the previous quarter due to earnings miss. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q3 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.