Baron Funds, an investment management company, released its “Baron Asset Fund” first quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. US markets continued its strong rally in the first quarter. Robust economic data and relatively strong corporate earnings boosted the rally along with the anticipation of a soft landing of the market. The fund (Institutional Shares) appreciated 6.00% in the quarter compared to 9.50% for the Russell Midcap Growth Index and 10.56% for the S&P 500 Index. Stock selection and headwinds from the Fund’s longtime style biases led the fund to underperform in the first quarter. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.
Baron Asset Fund featured stocks like VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) in the first quarter 2024 investor letter. Established in 1995, VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) offers domain name registry services and internet infrastructure. On May 13, 2024, VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) stock closed at $171.09 per share. One-month return of VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) was -6.32%, and its shares lost 23.78% of their value over the last 52 weeks. VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) has a market capitalization of $17.041 billion.
Baron Asset Fund stated the following regarding VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) in its first quarter 2024 investor letter:
“VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN), a global provider of internet infrastructure and domain name registry services, manages the .com and .net domains. Shares of VeriSign declined because of continued weakness in new domain registrations, stemming largely from weaker demand in China. We believe that VeriSign maintains an exceptional competitive position and the contractual ability to raise prices. Longer term, we are encouraged by VeriSign’s opportunity to win the rights to administer the “.web” domain, produce substantial free cash flow, and generate attractive capital returns as it continues to prioritize share buybacks.”
A close-up view of an engineer deploying a new piece of internet infrastructure.
VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. At the end of the fourth quarter, VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) was held by 38 hedge fund portfolios, compared to 35 in the previous quarter, according to our database.
We discussed VeriSign, Inc. (NASDAQ:VRSN) in another article and shared the list of most profitable companies with highest margins. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q1 2024 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.
