Fred Alger Management, an investment management company, released its “Alger Weatherbie Specialized Growth Fund” third quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. U.S. equities performed well in the third quarter of 2024, with the S&P 500 rising 5.89%. Utilities and Real Estate sectors outperformed relative to the index while the Energy and Information Technology sectors detracted. Against this backdrop, Class A shares of the fund underperformed the Russell 2500 Growth Index in the quarter. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
Alger Weatherbie Specialized Growth Fund highlighted stocks like Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA), in the third quarter 2024 investor letter. Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) is a diagnostics company that develops and commercializes molecular testing services. The one-month return of Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) was 37.57%, and its shares gained 186.33% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On December 2, 2024, Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) stock closed at $169.82 per share with a market capitalization of $22.42 billion.
Alger Weatherbie Specialized Growth Fund stated the following regarding Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) in its Q3 2024 investor letter:
“Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) is a specialty lab providing genetic testing services in the reproductive health, oncology and transplant markets. Reproductive health tests are run to screen for common genetic disorders such as trisomy 13, 18, and 21 in pregnant women – these tests are also known as non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT). The company’s oncology franchise is led by Signatera, a test used to detect minimal residual disease (MRD) – the applications of this test are primarily to monitor therapy response and detect cancer recurrence. Lastly, Natera’s transplant franchise is led by Prospera, a test used to monitor transplant organ rejection. Natera’s tests are all based on the company’s proprietary liquid biopsy platform to detect cell-free DNA. During the quarter, shares contributed to performance after the company reported better-than-expected fiscal second quarter revenues, driven by strong volume growth from new and existing patients. Moreover, higher pricing and product cost control led to gross margin expansion, as management believes this trend should continue as key productivity initiatives like less costly sequencing in the neo-natal franchise are just beginning to positively impact earnings. Importantly, Natera achieved positive cash flow for the second consecutive quarter.”
A laboratory environment with technicians in lab coats conducting molecular testing services.
Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) is not on our list of 31 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 62 hedge fund portfolios held Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) at the end of the third quarter which was 60 in the previous quarter. Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) reported $439.8 million in revenue, representing a 64% increase from Q3 2023. While we acknowledge the potential of Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) 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 Natera, Inc. (NASDAQ:NTRA) and shared the list of high growth healthcare stocks to invest in. 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.