any opinion about ARTHX ?

andrei

Usually people discuss ARTGX or other Artisan funds. Meanwhile their relatively new fund ARTHX looks quite intriguing. Its managers are Dragan (new person at Artisan, but with some experience in MFS) and Yokey, the lead manager of ARTIX (huge fund, which was very successful 10 years ago) and ARTJX (even more successful some time ago but closed).

ARTHX opened in March 2010, and since that time it significantly outperformed average world stock funds, and slightly outperformed ARTGX. It is a tiny fund, only 13 mil, so it can be very nimble. Did anybody look at it with a magnifying glass?

Investor

ARTHX a tiny fund which is the growth leaning global fund at Artisan. There is an expense waiver holding the expenses at 1.50% otherwise the expenses are naturally high given the small size of the fund. Managers have done great with this small asset base which may or may not be possible when the fund grows bigger and it is starting to get attention.

I've personally started an investment in this fund 2 weeks ago and proposed to David that this might be a good fund to review.

I do not have ARTGX but I do have ARTKX which is very similar to ARTGX. That covers the value side of International.

Sven

Reply to @Investor: "Yokey, the lead manager of ARTIX (huge fund, which was very successful 10 years ago)"

Until last year or so, ARTIX has underperformed for several years. Several factors contributed to the performance - asset has grown to over $10B and heavy weighing in banking sectors. In its early days with small asset Mark Yockey invested in all-caps while able to navigate from one sector to another. This advantage disappeared as the fund grown. Perhaps the new global fund with its small asset will regain these advantages again.

We have ARTIX and DODFX in our 401(K) plan and I don't use them for obvious reasons. Personally I like FMI International, FMIJX, better with their conservative approach, and the small asset base.

Investor

Reply to @Sven: That was the idea. I am hoping that the manager duo will produce returns similar to early ARTIX performance.

I do have the majority of my foreign exposure in ARTKX and FMIJX. FMIJX is newer and I do like FMIJX a lot. I consider these two as my core International exposure.

I've got smaller investments in MAPIX, WAEMX, GPGOX, GPIOX and ARTHX. The last 3 are my recent additions. I've sold OAKEX to partially fund the purchases in this trio. All these funds collectively are less than my ARTKX and FMIJX exposure.

AndyJ

Reply to @Investor: I read somewhere that the ARTIX turnaround of the last year or so was fueled by a big shift toward consumer staples stocks, and see also that ARTHX is pretty heavy in the category, too. I think Yockey used to be really growthy in his investment style, and seems to be taking more of a defensive approach lately.

Sven

Reply to @AndyJ: That is what good active management is all about. Imagine what the fund would perform if it invested heavily with financial stocks.

AndyJ

Reply to @Sven: Of course. But he wasn't doing much "good active management" for several years - so this is a welcome development.

Sven

Reply to @AndyJ: I also notice two additional co-managers have been added to ARTIX. Considering ARTIX's AUM was reduced to half of what it was, this change may reflect a new risk management process. Nevertheless it is encouraging for the shareholders of ARTIX and ARTGX. going forward.

Sven

Reply to @Investor: Look like we share similar foreign funds. Since 2011, I have reduced the number of core foreign funds to HAINX, LZEMX (401K), and FMIJX (newest addition). Several smaller positions are MASCX, WAEMX, DEM, and VGK. VGK is more of an opportunistic play for European large companies. At present I am also considering establishing a small position on GPGOX.

Kenster1_GlobalValue

I see some comparisons made between ARTHX and ARTGX but realize that the short-term outperformance can be seen across the board whenever you compare a growth or garp oriented fund with a value oriented fund. Again I'm talking about the past 1, 3 and 5 years where growth/garp style has performed well relative to the value style.

In fact, for those who are already have a heavily Global value leaning portfolio and would like to inject some Global growth investing style to balance things a bit, I also like ARTRX (Artisan Global Opportunities) fund although it is a bit pricey. They are pretty much the same team of 4 Managers that runs the Artisan Midcap Fund and so they don't rely on a single Star Manager.

ARTRX is up nicely around 19% YTD. I believe ARTRX is even growthier than ARTIX but again - ARTRX isn't for everyone it's a global growth option if say you had a heavily global value and global dividend oriented exposure and wanted to add some global 'zing' to your portfolio because remember that growth and value can take turns outperforming each other.

Top 10 stocks of ARTHX & %:
=================
Nestle SA (Switzerland) 3.4
Google Inc (United States) 2.8
Mastercard Inc (United States) 2.4
AIA Group Ltd (Hong Kong) 2.3
Apple Inc (United States) 2.3
Japan Tobacco Inc (Japan) 2.3
Calbee Inc (Japan) 2.3
Anadarko Petroleum Corp (United States) 2.0
SABMiller PLC (United Kingdom) 1.9
American Express Co (United States) 1.9


Top 10 stocks of ARTRX & %:
=================
Monsanto Co 5.2
Apple Inc 5.1
Google Inc 4.5
IHS Inc 4.5
EMC Corp 3.9
eBay Inc 3.8
Starbucks Corp 3.8
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals Inc 3.8
Discover Financial Services 3.7
Biogen Idec Inc 3.4

AndyJ

Reply to @Sven: Good catch on the two new co-managers. The M* management page says they're with Yockey on all 3 of the Artisan funds he runs. Hamker is apparently French, and presumably the European specialist on the team. The team sounds pretty attractive ....