Top tech fund likes data, chip shares as Nasdaq tops record

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Out-of-favor networking and data centers look attractive as the Nasdaq Composite index breaks new records, said Kevin Landis, whose $133.4 million Firsthand Technology Opportunities fund is the top performing U.S. tech fund this year.

Most tech investors continue to focus on wearable devices or so-called sharing economy companies such as taxi service Uber Inc or private real estate rental company Airbnb, Landis said.

Shares of fitness tracking device Fitbit Inc , for instance, jumped as much as 60 percent in their debut on Thursday, valuing the company at $6.5 billion.

Yet Landis has been moving more of his portfolio to such networking companies as Rackspace Hosting Inc and Palo Alto Networks Inc , as well as data center companies such as Equinix Inc that should benefit as more businesses move their operations to the cloud, he said.

"More money is chasing sharing economy companies, and no one is looking at data centers right now. It's making it easier to pay the right price for a company," Landis said.

The Nasdaq Composite hit 5,137.36 Thursday, topping the previous high of 5,132.52 it posted in March 2000 during the height of the dot com bubble. The index is up 8.3 percent for the year, outpacing the approximately 3 percent gain in the broader Standard & Poor's 500 index.

Landis, whose largest positions are Apple Inc, Amazon.com inc, and Tencent Holdings Ltd <0700.HK> are up all by more than 16 percent for the year to date, has started to trim his position in chipmaker Ambarella Inc , which has jumped 141 percent over the same time.

The Firsthand Technology fund is up 13.8 percent for the year through Wednesday, according to Lipper data.

(Reporting by David Randall; Editing by David Gregorio)

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