Sands Capital Global Growth Fund Exited Nike (NKE) in Q2

Sands Capital, an investment management company, released its “Sands Capital Global Growth Strategy” second-quarter 2025 investor letter. A copy of the letter can be downloaded here. Global Growth adopts a flexible approach to identify the most promising growth companies worldwide. Global equities outperformed the MSCI ACWI in the quarter. The portfolio returned 21.7% in the quarter compared to 11.5% for the index. The second quarter results were the fourth best in both absolute and relative terms since its 2008 inception. You can check the fund’s top 5 holdings to know more about its best picks for 2025.

In its second-quarter 2025 investor letter, Sands Capital Global Growth Strategy highlighted stocks such as NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE). NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) designs, develops, and markets athletic footwear, apparel, equipment, and accessories. The one-month return of NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) was -4.60%, and its shares lost 10.07% of their value over the last 52 weeks. On September 16, 2025, NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) stock closed at $72.75 per share, with a market capitalization of $107.44 billion.

Sands Capital Global Growth Strategy stated the following regarding NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) in its second quarter 2025 investor letter:

"The top individual absolute detractors were On Holding, Atlassian, NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE), Builders FirstSource, and Carlisle Companies. Nike is the largest athletic footwear and apparel company in the world by revenue. We sold the business in the second quarter.

We exited Nike to fund the position in On Holding. In our view, On represents a faster-growing, earlier-stage version of Nike, which we believe is now a maturing business facing several operational and cultural challenges. We misjudged the extent of Nike’s market saturation and the implications for potential growth. We also gave the company too much time to recover from self-inflicted missteps—most notably its COVID-era shift toward direct sales, which came at the expense of wholesale partnerships, product innovation, and critical technology infrastructure."

NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) is not on our list of 30 Most Popular Stocks Among Hedge Funds. As per our database, 81 hedge fund portfolios held NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) at the end of the second quarter, which was 81 in the previous quarter. While we acknowledge the potential of NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) 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.

In another article, we covered NIKE, Inc. (NYSE:NKE) and shared the list of stocks Jim Cramer discussed. In addition, please check out our hedge fund investor letters Q2 2025 page for more investor letters from hedge funds and other leading investors.

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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.