Carmignac Portfolio Grande Europe

"Liberation Day" on April 2nd kicked off the month with a significant spike in volatility, as substantial duties on imports were introduced.

The flash manufacturing PMI for April presented a mixed picture across Europe. While France and Germany saw slight declines, other regions experienced improvements.

In response to these economic conditions, the European Central Bank (ECB) cut key interest rates by 0.25 percentage points, as inflation was on track to settle around the 2% target.

This outperformance was primarily driven by our active management and stock selection in the Consumer sector.

At the stock level, L’Oréal was the top contributor to the fund's performance, reporting strong first-quarter sales growth fuelled by robust demand for their products, particularly in Europe.

Sartorius also performed well in April, with increased sales revenue for the first quarter, alongside improved profitability and operational efficiency.

However, the main detractors were stocks in the Healthcare sector.

Novo Nordisk was the largest detractor, facing heightened competition from its main peer, Eli Lilly, which weighed on investor sentiment and raised concerns about sales growth.

We added a small position in Bechtle, a German IT service company, and Kion, a market leader with approximately 30% share in the industrial forklift market in Western Europe, which should benefit from European consolidation.

We also initiated a position in Unilever, which is expected to perform well in uncertain market conditions.

Throughout the month, we increased our exposure to several Healthcare names, particularly in the biotech sector, such as Merus and Zealand Pharma, which have strong fundamentals and were hit the hardest.

The Fund continues to rely on bottom-up fundamental analysis with a medium-to-long-term horizon.

We remain committed to our philosophy and believe this is a great opportunity for our investors to gain access to some of Europe’s best companies at attractive entry valuations.