Lee Ainslie’s Maverick Capital is betting on Netflix once again and beefing up positions in several beaten-up technology stocks after a rough year for the sector. The hedge fund opened a fresh stake worth $82.9 million in Netflix during the third quarter, according to regulatory filings. Ainslie owned the streaming stock earlier this year, but liquidated his position during the second quarter. Netflix shares have come under pressure this year in an increasingly competitive streaming environment, with shares down roughly 49%. A broad sell-off in tech-related names also pressured the streaming giant. Despite the stock’s performance, Bank of America double-upgraded the stock to a buy rating this week, saying the company’s password sharing and ad tier initiatives could drive upside for the stock. To be sure, some funds dissolved positions in Netflix during the third quarter, including David Tepper’s Appaloosa. Coatue Management, meanwhile, trimmed its position in the streaming stock. Along with Netflix, Maverick also opened a fresh stake in the life science company Avantor worth roughly $120.1 million and equal to nearly a third of the fund’s portfolio, according to InsiderScore. Shares of Avantor, which provides chemicals and materials for health care and biopharma companies, are down about 49% this year and hit a fresh 52-week low in October. Ainslie, who is well-known for taking positions in technology stocks, founded Maverick Capital in 1993. The fund currently manages about $4.4 billion in assets, according to InsiderScore. Before launching Maverick, Ainslie worked under legendary hedge fund manager Julian Robertson at Tiger Management. Maverick trimmed its Coupang position by 3.9% to roughly $1.35 billion, but the South Korean e-commerce name remained the fund’s largest stake as of the end of September. T-Mobile , Amazon and Microsoft were also among Maverick’s top positions. The fund also upped its stake in Facebook’s parent-company Meta Platform s by 25% to $122.3 million, while bolstering its stake in Salesforce by 263.2%, according to InsiderScore. Shares of both stocks have plummeted roughly 66% and 39%, respectively, in 2022 amid this year’s tech-heavy market sell-off.
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