Madison Small Cap Fund: Cogent Communications (CCOI) is Experiencing Early Growing Pains

Group 1 - Madison Small Cap Fund's second-quarter 2025 performance was impacted by the liberation day tariffs, which initially caused a decline in equities and treasuries, followed by a rebound due to a pause in tariff implementation and positive macroeconomic data [1] - The Russell 2000 Index increased by 8.5% for the quarter and is down only 1.79% year-to-date, while the Madison Small Cap Fund (class Y) returned 4.42% in the quarter, underperforming compared to the Russell 2000 and Russell 2500 [1] - The fund highlighted Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ:CCOI) as a key stock, which has seen a one-month return of 0.35% but a significant decline of 48.00% over the last 52 weeks, with a market capitalization of $1.852 billion as of September 17, 2025 [2] Group 2 - The underperformance of Madison Small Cap Fund was attributed to stock selection in Information Technology and Consumer Staples, with Cogent Communications Holdings, Inc. being the worst-performing IT stock [3] - Cogent Communications, which carries nearly 25% of the world's internet traffic, recently launched Wavelength Services aimed at providing high-capacity, low-latency networking connections, but the company slightly missed growth expectations for this service, leading to a sharp decline in stock price [3] - The company has been viewed as experiencing early growing pains with its new service, and the fund has taken this opportunity to increase its investment in CCOI, believing the market reaction to be an overreaction [3]