We recently published a list of Billionaire Mason Hawkins’ 10 Mid-Cap Stocks with Huge Upside Potential. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV) stands against other billionaire Mason Hawkins’ mid-cap stocks with huge upside potential.
Billionaire Mason Hawkins is the founder and chairperson of Southeastern Asset Management. We recently covered Billionaire Mason Hawkins’ 10 Small-Cap Stocks with Huge Upside Potential, discussing his value investment strategy. Here’s a piece from the article:
“Value investment is an investment strategy that employs buying stocks of well-managed and quality companies at prices significantly below their intrinsic value. The core of Hawkins’ strategy is to purchase equities when their market price is no more than 60% of the firm’s appraisal of their intrinsic value. Value investors believe that the market overreacts to economic news, which leads to movement in stock prices, however, this news does not affect the long-term fundamentals of a company. Therefore, investors like Mason Hawkins do not follow the herd and use financial research and analysis to find quality companies. Value investors are also known for holding companies for the long term, but also actively ferret out stock that the market is underestimating.
Hawkins’ disciplined and research-based investment strategy has earned him widespread recognition. He achieved Investor’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005 and was also named Domestic Equity Fund Manager of the Year by Morningstar in 2006.”
Mason Hawkins is one of the key figures for value investment literature. He has been a keynote speaker for the Value Investment Conference at the Ben Graham Centre for Value Investing, where he discussed how a company has to be fit both qualitatively and quantitatively. Hawkins noted that Benjamin Graham, who is known as the father of value investing, talked about all great investments being a qualitative and quantitative fit, the quantitative nature being judged by the Price to Value ratio, whereas qualitative health being judged by the competitiveness of the business and the quality of your partner. He further explained that investors should look at businesses that are likely to get better with time, not vice versa. Moreover, on the management side, investors should look at the partners that are running the company and their ability to generate free cash flow and reinvest it very intelligently.
Hawkins also has a famous quote related to Graham’s strategy, which has been cited in a renowned book, The Art of Value Investing: How the World’s Best Investors Beat the Market by John Heins and Whitney Tilson.
“Our view is simply that superior long‐term investment performance can be achieved when financially strong, competitively entrenched, well‐managed companies are bought at prices significantly below their business value and sold when they approach that corporate worth. The quantitative piece of that is that we only want to buy when we can pay less than 60 percent of a conservative appraisal of a company’s value, based on the present value of future free cash flows, current liquidation value and/or comparable sales.”
This qualitative and quantitative value investment strategy is reflected in Southeastern Asset Management’s strategies. The fund has a concentrated stock portfolio of only 40 to 50 companies. Let’s now take a look at stocks with huge upside potential from Billionaire Mason Hawkins’ portfolio.
Our Methodology
To compile the list of billionaire Mason Hawkins’ 10 mid-cap stocks with huge upside potential, we sifted through 13F filings of Southeastern Asset Management, from Insider Monkey. From these filings, we checked each stock’s upside potential from CNN and ranked the stocks in ascending order of the upside potential. We have also added the stake Southeastern Asset Management holds in each company and the hedge fund sentiment around each stock. Please note that the data was recorded on May 4, 2025. Also note that for this article, we have defined mid-cap companies as those with a market capitalization between $10 billion to $55 billion.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).
A group of people in a large music venue, enjoying a vibrant concert.
Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV)
Market Capitalization: $31.00 billion
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 60
Southeastern Asset Management Stake: $1,824,137
Analyst Upside Potential: 23.35%
Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV) is one of the largest live entertainment companies in the world. It operates through several business segments, including Concerts, Ticketing, and Sponsorships & Advertising. The company owns and operates numerous venues globally and invests in businesses related to live events.
The company recently released its Q1 2025 results, and the management is already citing 2025 to be a historic year for live music. The company recorded unprecedented growth in demand for live music concerts, driven by more artists touring around the world. The deferred revenue for Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV) reached a record high of $5.4 billion for concerts and $270 million for Ticketmaster, representing a 24% and 13% increase, respectively.
The company has sold more than 95 million tickets for concerts so far in 2025, and stadium ticket sales are also up 80%. To meet this increasing demand, Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV) is adding 20 major venues by 2026 with a capacity to accommodate 7 million more people. It is one of billionaire Mason Hawkins’ 10 mid-cap stocks with huge upside potential.
Baron Focused Growth Fund stated the following regarding Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“In the fourth quarter, we initiated a new position in Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV), the leader in the management and operation of live concerts at their owned and third-party venues. They are a leader in concert venue operations, tour promotions, event ticketing through Ticketmaster, and the selling of sponsorships and advertising on their website and owned venues. Live Nation’s dominant share in ticketing and unmatched scale in concert promotions are key competitive advantages for them and give them the ability to monetize tours through ticketing, sponsorships, and hig-margin food and beverage at their owned and operated venues. Concerts and live events are a secular growing business that we believe should grow at a high single-digit rate for the company as the industry grows and they take share. We believe the company has an opportunity to significantly increase pricing or add new supply given the continued consumer preference for experiences over goods and the scarce nature of these events. The company has an incredible brand, and benefits in both upcycles with strong demand, and downcycles through an increase in supply as touring is a significant part of artists’ incomes. Despite concerns about slower consumer spending growth from peak levels, the company continues to grow at a double-digit rate in revenue despite consumer worries and is now leaning in with increased marketing to grow internationally where it remains underpenetrated. The company is still generating strong cash flow with a robust balance sheet to fund venue renovations where it expects to generate 20% returns on capital. John Malone of Liberty Media still owns 30% of the business with the CEO owning a significant portion of his net worth in the stock. We believe valuation remains attractive at current levels given the double-digit growth we expect in both revenue and earnings over the coming years.”
Overall, LYV ranks 3rd on our list of billionaire Mason Hawkins’ mid-cap stocks with huge upside potential. While we acknowledge the potential of LYV 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 time frame. There is an AI stock that went up since the beginning of 2025, while popular AI stocks lost around 25%. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than LYV but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.
READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and 30 Best Stocks to Buy Now According to Billionaires.
Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
