Baron Funds manager Ron Baron (Trades, Portfolio) has a reputation for investing in small, underappreciated companies, and his additions to his portfolio in the first quarter reinforce that reputation.
Baron added to well over 100 holdings in his portfolio in the first quarter, some of which are among his most valuable stakes even though they are not generally well known to many investors. The impacts of those additions on Baron’s portfolio were modest, even negligible. The largest addition to his portfolio – in terms of its impact – was only 0.27%. That was Diplomat Pharmacy Inc (DPLO, Financial).
Baron added 29,883 shares to his third-most valuable stake, CoStar Group Inc (CSGP, Financial), a Washington, D.C.-based commercial real estate information and marketing provider, for an average price of $188.83 per share.
CoStar Group has a market cap of $6.62 billion and an enterprise value of $6.58 billion. It has a P/E of 225, a Price/Book of 4.3 and a Price/Sales of 10.4. Mariko Gordon (Trades, Portfolio), Pioneer Investments (Trades, Portfolio), Frank Sands (Trades, Portfolio) and Murray Stahl (Trades, Portfolio) have shares of CoStar Group in his portfolio. Julian Robertson (Trades, Portfolio) sold his stake in the first quarter.
Baron’s addition to his fourth-most valuable stake, Arch Capital Group Ltd (ACGL, Financial), was considerably smaller. He bought 735 shares for an average price of $60.06 per share.
At its website, Arch Capital Group says it is “a Bermuda public limited liability company [that] writes insurance and reinsurance on a worldwide basis.” It has a market cap of $8.14 billion and an enterprise value of $8.98 billion. It has a P/E of 9.7, a Price/Book of 1.4 and a Price/Sales of 2.1. Jim Simons (Trades, Portfolio), Third Avenue Management (Trades, Portfolio), Ruane Cunniff (Trades, Portfolio) and David Dreman (Trades, Portfolio) have shares of Arch Capital in their portfolios. Ken Fisher (Trades, Portfolio), Jeremy Grantham (Trades, Portfolio) and Paul Tudor Jones (Trades, Portfolio) sold their stakes in the first quarter.
Baron also added to the 10th-most valuable stake in his portfolio, Under Armour Inc (UA, Financial), a sports clothing and accessories company headquartered in Baltimore. Baron acquired 13,917 shares of Under Armour for an average price of $73.57 per share.
Under Armour has a market cap of $17.54 billion and an enterprise value of $18.18 billion. It has a P/E of 88.7, a Price/Book of 12.8 and a Price/Sales of 5.5. Jim Simons (Trades, Portfolio), Jeremy Grantham (Trades, Portfolio), Murray Stahl (Trades, Portfolio), Ken Fisher (Trades, Portfolio) and Dodge & Cox have shares of Under Armour in their portfolios. Steve Mandel (Trades, Portfolio) and Ray Dalio (Trades, Portfolio) sold their stakes in the first quarter.
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