Stevens Capital Management, managed by Matthew Tewksbury, has disclosed its equity positions as of March 31 in a Form 13F filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Pennsylvania-based Stevens Capital Management is an investment adviser that manages a multi-billion dollar hedge fund, which has been in business for over 20 years. Stevens Capital specializes in quantitative investment methods, and has more than $3 billion in assets under management. According to the filing, the value of the fund’s equity portfolio totaled $2.81 billion. The fund had a strong focus on stocks in the finance, technology, healthcare, and consumer discretionary sectors. The technology sector represents about 13% of the total portfolio and we’ll discuss the top technology picks of Stevens Capital in this article, which are Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ:MU), Priceline Group Inc (NASDAQ:PCLN), Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT), and Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT).
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Now then, let’s discuss Stevens Capital’s top technology picks, beginning with Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ:MU), a $29.4-billion market cap provider of advanced semiconductor systems. The fund increased its stake in Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) by over 40% to 1.29 million shares, with the value of the holding amounting to $35.0 million. Micron posted strong financial results for the second quarter of fiscal 2015, with net income of $934 million, or $0.78 per diluted share, compared to $731 million, or $0.61 per diluted share in the same quarter last year. Recently, Micron Technology Inc. (NASDAQ:MU) conducted a $1 billion offering of senior notes, which included $550 million of 5.250% notes due 2024, and $450 million of 5.625% notes due 2026. The largest shareholders of Micron among the funds we track are David Einhorn’s Greenlight Capital and Viking Global, led by Andreas Halvorsen.
Next up is Priceline Group Inc (NASDAQ:PCLN), a new position of Stevens Capital, which consists of 22,274 shares worth nearly $26 million. With a market cap of $62.5 billion, Priceline Group Inc (NASDAQ:PCLN) is engaged in providing online travel and travel related reservation and search services. The company’s net income for the first quarter of 2015 increased by 3% to $429 million. It reported gross travel bookings of $13.8 billion, an increase of 12% over the year-ago quarter. Other investors with big positions in the company include Stephen Mandel’s Lone Pine Capital, and David Tepper’s Appaloosa Management.
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) still ranks as one of Stevens Capital’s top tech picks, despite it reducing its position in the company by over 55%. The stake contains 388,076 shares, with a reported value of $15.78 million. Shares of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) has risen by 19.8% since May 2014. Last week, reports were surfacing that Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) would buy Salesforce.com, Inc (NYSE:CRM), which leads the $20 billion-a-year cloud CRM sector with a 16% market share. Elevation Partners co-founder Roger McNamee, in an interview with CNBC, said that Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) should not buy Salesforce.com, inc. (NYSE:CRM), because large transactions in the software industry have historically had disastrous aftermaths.
It seems that Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) may been thinking along the same lines as Reuters has reported that Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) has no plans to acquire Salesforce, citing the company’s high valuation. The largest investor of Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) among the funds we track is First Eagle Investment Management, which disclosed owning 34.44 million shares of the company as of the end of March, worth $1.40 billion.
Lastly, we will discuss Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT), another new position of Stevens Capital. The new holding contains 692,803 shares, valued at $15.63 million. Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT) offers precision materials engineering solutions for the semiconductor, flat panel display and solar photovoltaic industries. The market cap of the company is $24.5 billion. Year-to-date, the company’s stock has dropped by an alarming 21.02%, opening today’s trading session at $19.92.
At the end of April, Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT) announced a new share repurchase program that authorized the repurchasing of up to $3 billion worth of the company’s common shares over the next three years, beginning in the third quarter of fiscal 2015. Other investors that see value in Applied Materials Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT) include Mason Capital Management, led by Kenneth Mario Garschina, and Ken Griffin’s Citadel Investment Group.
Disclosure: None
