Wymer: Lots of Opportunity for NVIDIA, But It Won’t be Easy

Katie Reichart: I'm Katie Reichart with Morningstar. I'm here with Steve Wymer of Fidelity Growth Company. He's Morningstar's Domestic-Stock Fund Manager of the Year. Thanks for being here, Steve.

Steve Wymer: Katie, thanks for having me here and it's an honor to receive your reward. Morningstar's a long-term steward in the industry, and it's great on behalf of all Fidelity and the people I work with to receive the award from Morningstar.

Katie Reichart: Thanks. So the market was really geared for growth in 2017. The fund was up almost 37%, well ahead of peers and relevant benchmarks. What really gave the fund an edge in 2017?

Steve Wymer: Well, a lot of good things happened in growth, so as you point out the benchmark was strong. Just keeping up with the benchmark we had a lot of names that helped. The benchmark was up almost 30%, and so many names contributed. But at the top of the fund, the large holding in NVIDIA, was the most important contributor to the fund. Their movement and continued movement into accelerated computing, movement into the data center, and eventually into autonomous driving is really powering that stock. Then we had a lot of help from some key biotech stocks, too.

Katie Reichart: With NVIDIA, that's been a long-term holding for the fund that really paid off the past couple years. So, with the position size where it is, how are you thinking about it relative to its valuation?

Steve Wymer: I think what NVIDIA has done has had some expertise in accelerated computing. They've applied that for years into the video gaming space. Currently, they are expanding that into the data center. We're more familiar with that for AI and machine learning workloads, and what they have coming down the road for autonomous vehicles where they have a strong position with many manufacturers that should provide some growth ahead in 2019, 2020, and the years ahead. So, we think there's a good opportunity for that stock. We're not sure how far is up, but it depends on how they execute and what competition does, too.

Katie Reichart: So, still a good holding for now.

Steve Wymer: So, they have a lot of opportunity in front of them, but it won't be easy.

Katie Reichart: Steve, thanks so much for being here.

Steve Wymer: Thanks for having me here.