ClearBridge Investments, an investment management company, released its “ClearBridge Large Cap Growth Strategy” fourth quarter 2024 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. During a time of momentum-driven returns and heightened investor optimism following Donald Trump's re-election, the more defensively oriented Strategy lagged behind. The S&P 500 Index advanced 2.41% in the quarter to finish 2024 up 25.02%. The benchmark Russell 1000 Growth Index (RLG) jumped 7.07% for the quarter and 33.36% for the year. In addition, please check the fund’s top five holdings to know its best picks in 2024.

ClearBridge Large Cap Growth Strategy highlighted stocks like ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) in the fourth quarter 2024 investor letter. Headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) is a clinical research organization. The one-month return of ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) was 3.07%, and its shares lost 17.92% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On January 7, 2025, ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) stock closed at $222.58 per share with a market capitalization of $18.38 billion.

ClearBridge Large Cap Growth Strategy stated the following regarding ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:

"The Strategy’s more defensive positioning was the primary detractor during the quarter, highlighted by our exposure to the underperforming health care sector. Our health care holdings suffered from a combination of negative investor sentiment toward managed care holding UnitedHealth Group and sluggish biotechnology and pharmaceutical R&D spending negatively impacting portfolio holding Thermo Fisher Scientific. Despite weak recent performance, we continue to believe that health care offers durable growth trends and adds resilience to the portfolio.

We took advantage of that negative sentiment to establish a new position in ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR), a leading contract research organization (CRO) that handles clinical trials for biopharmaceutical companies. The CRO industry has experienced multiple compression in recent years, driven by slowing pharma and biotech spending by large clients, resulting in a meaningful dislocation in ICON’s multiple. We believe current growth is below normal and should revert toward historical levels in the coming years. ICON is a strong player in the CRO industry demonstrating consistent share gains with a strong management team."

A laboratory setting with a team of scientists working on a clinical trial.

ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 48 hedge fund portfolios held ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) at the end of the third quarter which was 54 in the previous quarter. ICON Public Limited Company’s (NASDAQ:ICLR) third quarter revenue was $2.03 billion, represents a year-on-year decrease of 1.2% or 1% on a constant currency basis. While we acknowledge the potential of ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) 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 timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is as promising as NVIDIA but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.

In another article, we discussed ICON Public Limited Company (NASDAQ:ICLR) and shared American Century Investments International Growth Fund's views on the company. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q4 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.