Is Lazard Ltd (LAZ) A Smart Investment Pick?

Longleaf Partners Fund, a Memphis-based fund under Southeastern Asset Management, published its “Longleaf Partners Small-Cap Fund” fourth quarter 2021 investor letter – a copy of which can be downloaded here. Longleaf Partners Small-Cap Fund added 1.91% in the fourth quarter, roughly in line with the Russell 2000s 2.14% return. For the year, the Fund returned 11.18%, falling short of the Russell 2000, which returned 14.82%. Spare some time to check the fund’s top 5 holdings to have a clue about their top bets for 2022.

Longleaf Partners Small-Cap Fund, in its Q4 2021 investor letter, mentioned Lazard Ltd (NYSE: LAZ) and discussed its stance on the firm. Lazard Ltd is a Hamilton, Bermuda-based financial services company with a $3.5 billion market capitalization. LAZ delivered a -20.74% return since the beginning of the year, while its 12-month returns are down by -9.59%. The stock closed at $34.98 per share on February 28, 2022.

Here is what Longleaf Partners Small-Cap Fund has to say about Lazard Ltd in its Q4 2021 investor letter:

” In Financials, we own asset manager Lazard and two newer companies, all three of which are harder to understand than the simpler banks that drove the sector. We are confident that this differentiated positioning that caused the relative drag this year will be the very driver of future absolute and relative outperformance.”

Our calculations show that Lazard Ltd (NYSE: LAZ) failed to obtain a mark on our list of the 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. LAZ was in 15 hedge fund portfolios at the end of the fourth quarter of 2021, compared to 18 funds in the previous quarter. Lazard Ltd (NYSE: LAZ) delivered a -22.61% return in the past 3 months.

In March 2021, we also shared another hedge fund’s views on LAZ in another article. You can find other letters from hedge funds and prominent investors on our hedge fund investor letters 2021 Q4 page.

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