First Eagle Investment is Bullish Ambev (ABEV)

First Eagle Investment Management, an investment management firm, published its third-quarter 2021 investor letter – a copy of which can be downloaded here. A net return of -1.93% was delivered by its Global Fund for the third quarter of 2021. The Global Fund underperformed the MSCI World Index in the period. You can take a look at the fund’s top 5 holdings to have an idea about their best picks for 2021.

First Eagle Investment Management, in its Q3 2021 investor letter, mentioned Ambev S.A. (NYSE: ABEV) and discussed its stance on the firm. Ambev S.A. is a State of São Paulo, Brazil-based brewing company with a $48.3 billion market capitalization. ABEV delivered a -0.98% return since the beginning of the year, while its 12-month returns are up by 9.78%. The stock closed at $3.03 per share on November 25, 2021.

Here is what First Eagle Investment Management has to say about Ambev S.A.  in its Q3 2021 investor letter:

“The global flareup of the Delta variant of Covid-19 has weighed on the stocks tied to socialization and entertainment, including Brazilian brewer Ambev. Further, inflationary pressures—spawned by the commodity rally, drought and a weaker currency—have challenged Brazil’s nascent economic recovery and pushed input costs higher for many companies. Amid this difficult backdrop, Ambev (a subsidiary of Anheuser-Busch InBev) has reaped the benefits of its conservative management and strong balance sheet, aggressively bolstering its alreadydominant market share in many South and Central American markets. We believe the company is poised to benefit from favorable demographics and attractive consumption trends once the Brazilian economy gets back on track.”

Photo by Danilo Alvesd on Unsplash

Based on our calculations, Ambev S.A. (NYSE: ABEV) was not able to clinch a spot in our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. ABEV was in 15 hedge fund portfolios at the end of the third quarter of 2021, compared to 18 funds in the previous quarter. Ambev S.A. (NYSE: ABEV) delivered a -8.73% return in the past 3 months.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.