Strong Prospects for Artisan Global Opportunities

Greg Carlson: Artisan Global Opportunities is a strategy we have a lot of confidence in.

The four portfolio managers that lead the effort have an average of 15 years of experience on the team, and they are backed by 11 other members. The team runs two other strategies that earne Silver Morningstar Analyst Ratings, just like this one.

The team is looking for companies that are industry leaders, have accelerating profits, but also have pretty clean balance sheets. They tend to avoid speculative fare, but there is still risk in this approach. They are willing to pay up for growth, so valuation risk is a factor, and the portfolio is also concentrated with just 40 to 50 stocks.

Nevertheless, the fund has performed strongly on both a total return and risk-adjusted basis since the fund joined the world stock category in 2012. The funds leans to growth, so it has had an advantage over that period over the broader world stock category. But the fund has also beaten most of its competition that focuses just on growth stocks.

Finally, fees are just average here, so there is no cost advantage. However, we think the fund still has very strong prospects.