Baron Funds, an investment management company, released its “Baron Real Estate Fund” first quarter 2025 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. In Q1 2025, stocks were sold due to economic growth slowdown, inflation, and policymaking issues, including Baron Real Estate Fund®, without considering value. The fund declined 6.69% (Institutional Shares) in the quarter compared to a 3.11% decline for the MSCI USA IMI Extended Real Estate Index (the MSCI Real Estate Index) and a 0.76% gain for the MSCI US REIT Index (the REIT Index). In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2025.
In its first-quarter 2025 investor letter, Baron Real Estate Fund highlighted stocks such as Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX). Headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee, Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) provides building solutions for new home construction, repair and remodeling, and outdoor structure markets. The one-month return of Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) was 10.10%, and its shares gained 3.38% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On May 14, 2025, Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) stock closed at $92.70 per share with a market capitalization of $6.451 billion.
Baron Real Estate Fund stated the following regarding Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) in its Q1 2025 investor letter:
“Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) is a rapidly growing U.S. building products company that manufactures engineered wood siding and other wood products. The company benefits from leadership positions, secular material conversion, a rich product innovation pipeline, a strong balance sheet, and an excellent management team.
The company is currently valued at only 8.5 times estimated 2026 cash flow versus a multiple of 12 to 13 times that we believe is warranted relative to its publicly traded peers. A 12 to 13 times multiple would represent more than 35% upside from present levels.”
A construction worker standing on a rooftop with a toolbelt in hand, looking out at a new home development in the background.
Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 54 hedge fund portfolios held Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) at the end of the fourth quarter which was 39 in the previous quarter. Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) reported net sales of $724 million in Q1 2025, which was flat compared to the previous year’s quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) 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 undervalued AI stock set for massive gains.
In another article, we covered Louisiana-Pacific Corporation (NYSE:LPX) and shared Jim Cramer stocks to buy and sell. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q1 2025 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.
