Moneta Long Short

Moneta Asset Management, founded in 2003, is an employee-owned company that manages €3.8 billion across six funds (and three strategies). The firm consists of 32 professionals, with half analysts or fund managers. At the core of Moneta's funds is fundamental, bottom-up analysis with a core focus on European equities. Their investment style is pragmatic, relying on pure stock-picking without being tethered to value or growth. Instead, they opt for a contrarian approach, often focusing on companies that are overlooked or misunderstood by the market. Their decisions are made without regard to macroeconomic calls, emphasizing the importance of individual company analysis and with little interest in trying to time the market with exposure levels. Given this, the long short fund aims to have a net exposure of 40%, with 70% long and 30% short exposure approximate targets. About one-third of the fund's gross exposure is allocated to uncorrelated bets, which includes targeting holding company discounts or sector pair trading. The remaining two-thirds are invested in individual stocks for both long and short positions. For 2024, Moneta holds a constructive view due to attractive European company valuations, particularly in the SMID space, which has seen a significant de-rating compared to large caps over the past five years. Despite this, the firm is cautious, as maintaining profit margins in a potentially deflationary environment is a central focus of their analysis, especially given that inflation has previously aided many companies in raising prices.