The Oakmark Global Fund has released its portfolio commentary and performance metrics for the third quarter of 2026, offering investors a detailed look at the factors steering its global value-investing strategy. During a period defined by fluctuating macroeconomic indicators and shifting sector dynamics, the fund’s performance reflected the successes and near-term challenges of its concentrated portfolio. As markets continue to reprice assets in response to rapid technological transformation and global supply chain realignments, the fund’s management team at Harris Associates L.P. emphasized disciplined stock selection, opportunistic purchasing, and long-term intrinsic value creation.
Performance across the fund’s various share classes for the third quarter showed steady, positive returns. The Investor Class (OAKGX) posted a quarterly total return (QTD) of 1.68%, bringing its year-to-date (YTD) return to 3.56% and its one-year return to 8.97%. Over longer horizons, the Investor Class demonstrated resilience, delivering an annualized return of 11.44% over three years, 5.45% over five years, and 8.84% over the past decade, with a since-inception return of 9.32%.
Meanwhile, the Advisor Class (OAYGX), Institutional Class (OANGX), and R6 Class (OAZGX) recorded QTD returns of 1.71%, 1.73%, and 1.73%, respectively. For the year-to-date period, these classes advanced 3.69%, 3.74%, and 3.77%. Despite these positive results, the fund’s returns trailed broader global benchmarks for the quarter and year-to-date periods, as the MSCI World Index notched a QTD return of 1.88% and a YTD gain of 11.75%, while the MSCI World Value Index advanced 3.84% for the quarter and 14.74% for the year-to-date period.
IQVIA Leads Positive Contributors on Strong Healthcare Demand
A primary driver of the fund’s performance during the third quarter was IQVIA Holdings, a U.S.-headquartered provider of healthcare data, analytics, and clinical research services. Shares of the company moved higher following the release of robust second-quarter financial results. Key highlights from the report included double-digit bookings growth and an acceleration in organic revenue growth, signaling an improving demand environment across the pharmaceutical and biotech sectors, alongside higher win rates for the company’s clinical trials and consulting divisions.
Management at IQVIA proactively capitalized on lower stock valuations earlier in the year, repurchasing $950 million worth of stock during the first half. Furthermore, investor sentiment was buoyed by growing evidence that IQVIA’s proprietary, artificial intelligence-enabled offerings are successfully supporting client demand and driving operational productivity. These technological advancements have reinforced market confidence in the company’s long-term growth trajectory, making it a standout contributor to the portfolio. As of September 30, 2026, IQVIA represented 3.3% of the Oakmark Global Fund’s total net assets.
Operational Challenges at DSV Weigh on Near-Term Performance
Conversely, DSV, the Danish freight forwarding and logistics giant, served as a top detractor during the quarter. The company’s shares declined following a quarterly earnings report that brought to light operational hurdles within its Road division. Specifically, network integration and IT-related issues in several key European markets weighed on divisional profitability and dampened investor sentiment, overshadowing stronger operating results in the company’s Air & Sea and Contract Logistics segments.
Despite these headwinds, DSV’s management team has remained steadfastly focused on executing its long-term strategic goals, chief among them the integration of its major acquisition of DB Schenker, completed in 2025. Management reacted swiftly to the Road division’s operational glitches by appointing an experienced internal executive to take the helm of the business. Crucially, leadership confirmed that customer service levels have already rebounded significantly following the intervention.
While near-term execution issues have caused friction, the portfolio managers maintain high conviction in the investment case for the Schenker acquisition. They believe that successfully combining the two logistics networks will yield meaningful cost synergies and drive substantial profitability improvements over the long run. DSV accounted for 2.6% of the fund’s total net assets at the close of the third quarter.
Portfolio Activity: Strategic New Purchases in Meta Platforms and Sugi Holdings
To capture long-term value in an evolving market landscape, the fund introduced two notable new holdings to its portfolio during the period: Meta Platforms and Sugi Holdings.
Meta Platforms, the U.S.-headquartered technology titan whose Family of Apps—including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp—engages 3.6 billion daily active users, entered the portfolio following a period of market skepticism regarding its heavy capital expenditures in artificial intelligence. While the financial returns and growth of Meta’s core advertising business remain exceptional, Wall Street has frequently expressed concern over the sheer scale of the company’s AI infrastructure investments.
The portfolio managers hold a different perspective, expressing confidence that Meta possesses the strategic depth and execution capability to monetize its AI compute capacity. This monetization is expected to occur through a combination of core business improvements, the creation of new AI-driven products and services, and potentially the rental of third-party compute resources. Already, the company’s Family of Apps is demonstrably benefiting from upgraded recommendation and ad-matching algorithms. In addition, Meta has achieved a strong initial market reception with its new personal AI assistant, Muse. Trading near its lowest valuation multiples outside of the turbulent 2022 market period, Meta was purchased at a meaningful discount to the managers’ estimate of its intrinsic value, representing 1.9% of total net assets at quarter-end.
The second major addition, Sugi Holdings, is one of Japan’s leading drugstore chains. The company occupies a unique market position through its nationwide network of pharmacy-equipped retail locations, which provide a stable, growing, and defensive healthcare-focused revenue stream. Sugi continues to benefit from favorable domestic demographic trends, including an aging population, ongoing consolidation within Japan’s highly fragmented drugstore and dispensing pharmacy markets, and a disciplined corporate track record of successful mergers and acquisitions.
Under founder-led management, Sugi has established itself as an industry pioneer in digital transformation and AI adoption, leveraging technology to elevate operational efficiency, expand profit margins, and deepen customer engagement. The fund managers believe that broader market participants have overlooked Sugi’s long-term growth catalysts, including further domestic industry consolidation and strategic corporate partnerships. This disconnect has created an attractive risk-reward profile at current valuation levels, with Sugi accounting for 1.8% of the fund’s net assets as of September 30, 2026.
Other portfolio holdings rounding out the fund’s asset allocation as of the end of the third quarter include adidas at 2.4%, Owens Corning at 1.3%, Salesforce at 3.4%, and SAP at 2.5%, with stakes in companies such as ConocoPhillips, Deere, Gartner, and Prudential reduced to zero.
Harris Associates L.P. reiterates that while concentrated portfolios carry inherent volatility, disciplined adherence to value investing principles and rigorous fundamental research remain the cornerstones of the Oakmark Global Fund’s strategy as it navigates the macroeconomic environment ahead.
