Artisan Partners, an investment management company, released its “Artisan Small Cap Fund” second-quarter 2025 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. Global markets saw an incredible but volatile second quarter, shifting from deep declines to strong gains. In the quarter, its Investor Class fund ARTSX returned 7.30%, Advisor Class fund APDSX posted a return of 7.33%, and Institutional Class fund APHSX returned 7.36%, compared to a return of 11.97% for the Russell 2000 Growth Index. In addition, you can check the fund’s top 5 holdings to find out its best picks for 2025.
In its second-quarter 2025 investor letter, Artisan Small Cap Fund highlighted stocks such as Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN). Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN) designs and distributes products and processes to offer integrated solutions for the biopharma and healthcare industries. The one-month return of Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN) was -12.90%, and its shares gained 15.11% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On August 22, 2025, Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN) stock closed at $22.62 per share, with a market capitalization of $6.175 billion.
Artisan Small Cap Fund stated the following regarding Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN) in its second quarter 2025 investor letter:
“Notable adds in the quarter included Birkenstock, ServiceTitan and Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN). Stevanato is a leading provider of specialty glass and plastic packaging to the health care industry, as well as the leading machinery supplier to glass vial makers and fill and finish facilities. We believe a mix shift from bulk products to higher margin sterilized products and the overall growth of biologic drugs will drive attractive earnings growth. We increased our position as we gained greater confidence that the worst of the COVID-related inventory overstocking challenges had passed. Moving forward, we believe the company’s and industry’s profit cycle drivers are more likely to demonstrate the durable growth characteristics that originally attracted us to this stock.”
A scientist in a laboratory observing a drug delivery system through a microscope.
Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 8 hedge fund portfolios held Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN) at the end of the second quarter, which was 10 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of Stevanato Group S.p.A. (NYSE:STVN) as an investment, we believe certain AI stocks offer greater upside potential and carry less downside risk. If you’re looking for an extremely undervalued AI stock that also stands to benefit significantly from Trump-era tariffs and the onshoring trend, see our free report on the best short-term AI stock.
