Our discipline requires us to trim this tech stock again after 2023 rally powers into 2024

Published Mon, Mar 18 20248:52 AM EDT

Shortly after the opening bell, we will be selling 30 shares of Meta Platforms at roughly $490 each. Following the trade, Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust will own 293 shares of META, decreasing its weighting in the portfolio to 4.5% from 4.98%. When one of our stocks outperforms for an extended period, we run into the high-quality problem of that stock becoming too big of a position in the portfolio. That's where we currently find ourselves with Meta Platforms . Due to the stock's 194% gain in 2023 and continued outperformance so far in 2024, with shares up about 36% as of Friday's close, our Meta position has swelled to a roughly 5% weighing. Whenever one position hits about 5% in our 32-stock portfolio, it is our discipline to ring the register and lock in gains to prevent ourselves from becoming too greedy after a big move. In this case, we will realize a fantastic gain of about 120% on stock purchased in April 2022. Our discipline also prompted us to make a small Meta sale in early January , alongside a basket of other 2023 winners. The stock has already climbed around 40% since that trim. To be sure, Monday's sale reflects no changes to our long-term view on the Instagram and Facebook parent, which is why the company is still one of our larger positions. We see Meta as gaining share in the digital advertising market, partly because its use of AI tools has driven superior returns on investments for advertisers. In a note published Monday, analysts at Mizuho increased our confidence in Meta's ability to deliver revenue upside this year through improving monetization of Reels, expansion in other geographies, and its partnership with fellow Club holding Amazon for in-app shopping. Mizuho also cited long-term investments in WhatsApp, gen-AI, and the large language model Llama as potential upside drivers in the future. (Jim Cramer's Charitable Trust is long META and AMZN. See here for a full list of the stocks.) As a subscriber to the CNBC Investing Club with Jim Cramer, you will receive a trade alert before Jim makes a trade. Jim waits 45 minutes after sending a trade alert before buying or selling a stock in his charitable trust's portfolio. If Jim has talked about a stock on CNBC TV, he waits 72 hours after issuing the trade alert before executing the trade. THE ABOVE INVESTING CLUB INFORMATION IS SUBJECT TO OUR TERMS AND CONDITIONS AND PRIVACY POLICY , TOGETHER WITH OUR DISCLAIMER . NO FIDUCIARY OBLIGATION OR DUTY EXISTS, OR IS CREATED, BY VIRTUE OF YOUR RECEIPT OF ANY INFORMATION PROVIDED IN CONNECTION WITH THE INVESTING CLUB. NO SPECIFIC OUTCOME OR PROFIT IS GUARANTEED.