Meridian Funds, managed by ArrowMark Partners, released its “Meridian Growth Fund” third quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. On September 18th, the U.S. Federal Reserve (“Fed”) reduced interest rates by 0.5%, bringing much-needed relief to investors. This crucial action contributed to stabilizing the markets following a volatile August. During the quarter, small-cap stocks outperformed large-cap stocks, achieving gains of 9.3% and 6.1%, respectively, according to the Russell family of indices. In the quarter, the fund returned 6.78% (net) outperforming the benchmark, the Russell 2500 Growth Index’s 6.99% return. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
Meridian Growth Fund highlighted stocks like The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) in the third quarter 2024 investor letter. The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) manufactures and markets contact lens wearers that operate through CooperVision and CooperSurgical segments. The one-month return of The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) was -1.68%, and its shares gained 24.77% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On November 27, 2024, The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) stock closed at $103.43 per share with a market capitalization of $20.599 billion.
Meridian Growth Fund stated the following regarding The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) in its Q3 2024 investor letter:
“The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) is a medical technology firm with two main divisions: CooperVision, a leader in contact lenses, and CooperSurgical, which focuses on women’s health, including reproductive care and fertility. The stock experienced solid performance during the quarter, driven by strong organic growth and margin expansion. CooperVision gained market share and continues to generate pricing gains because of industry capacity constraints and a favorable product mix. During the quarter, we trimmed our position in the stock based on our valuation discipline.”
A doctor wearing gloves and a mask holding a pair of contact lenses in their hand.
The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 45 hedge fund portfolios held The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) at the end of the third quarter which was 39 in the previous quarter. The Cooper Companies, Inc.’s (NASDAQ:COO) consolidated quarterly revenues for the third quarter were slightly over $1 billion, up 8% year-over-year. While we acknowledge the potential of The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) 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 The Cooper Companies, Inc. (NASDAQ:COO) and shared Baron Asset Fund’s views on the company. 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.