For the past 12 years, growth stocks have been all the rage on Wall Street. This shouldn't come as a surprise given that historically low lending rates and ongoing quantitative easing measures from the Federal Reserve have made borrowing cheap. With abundant access to capital, fast-paced companies have been free to innovate, hire, and acquire.
Typically, we see the fastest sales growth from smaller companies. But that's not the case for the following four large-cap stocks (i.e., companies with a market cap of at least $10 billion). Based on Wall Street's consensus estimates, these hypergrowth large-cap stocks are expected to increase their sales 508% to 1,118% by 2024.
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Nio: 560% implied sales growth by 2024
It's no secret that electric vehicle (EV) manufacturers are set up perfectly to benefit from a multi-decade replacement cycle for consumer and enterprise vehicles. Nio's (NIO 6.42%) opportunity within EVs is perhaps even more impressive given that it's based in China, the world's largest auto market.
According to Wall Street, sales for Nio are expected to catapult from $2.55 billion in 2020 to $16.83 billion by 2024. For those of you keeping score at home, that's a 560% projected sales increase.
Initially, Nio's expansion was slowed by capital concerns. it's difficult to build an auto stock from the ground up. However, with the company now sitting on billions in cash, it's simply waiting for the global semiconductor shortage to right itself. Even with this shortage, Nio's monthly deliveries hovered around 8,000 in June and July. The company looks to be well on its way to reaching a 150,000-vehicle annual run rate, once the global chip shortage is addressed.
Equally exciting is Nio's unique battery-as-a-service venture, introduced one year ago. This program is designed to allow buyers of its premium EVs to upgrade or replace their batteries in the future. Consumers also receive a discount off the initial sticker price of the vehicle they're buying. In return, buyers pay a monthly subscription fee, which is high margin and will likely boost brand loyalty.
Nio will require patience from its shareholders, but all operating metrics look to be headed in the right direction.
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Snowflake: 508% implied sales growth by 2024
Perhaps it's no surprise that a cloud stock should be one of the fastest-growing large caps. Cloud data-warehousing company Snowflake (SNOW 3.52%) is expected to increase sales from the $592 million reported in fiscal 2021 to an estimated $3.6 billion by fiscal 2025. That's a 508% jump in just four years.
What makes Snowflake such a fast-growing company is its unique business approach. For instance, it has shunned subscriptions in favor of a more transparent pay-as-you-go model for its customers. The company also built its platform atop the leading cloud infrastructure services. While it can be difficult for businesses to share data when they have that information stored on competing platforms, Snowflake allows its users to share data seamlessly.
Through the first six months of fiscal 2022, sales have more than doubled, and its net retention rate in the second quarter actually expanded 1 percentage point to 169% from the sequential first quarter. In plainer English, this means existing clients spent 69% more in the second quarter of 2022 than they did in the comparable year-ago quarter.
Snowflake's sales growth has thus far shown no signs of slowing. The only question is: Can Wall Street and investors tolerate the company's nosebleed valuation with profitability still a ways off? At roughly 75 times Wall Street's forecasted sales for 2021, the jury is still out.
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Novavax: 1,118% implied sales growth by 2024
Among biotech stocks, you'll struggle to find a company that's expected to grow faster than Novavax (NVAX 2.79%). After bringing in $476 million in full-year sales in 2020, the consensus is calling for approximately $5.8 billion in revenue by 2024. That's a projected increase of more than 1,110%!
The reason Novavax should see its sales soar is the expected Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) for its coronavirus vaccine NVX-CoV2373. While the scientific name hardly rolls off the tongue, Novavax's COVID-19 vaccine has delivered strong efficacy in two large-scale studies. A broad-based U.K. study resulted in a vaccine efficacy (VE) of 89.7% in March, while a phase 3 trial in the U.S. and Mexico demonstrated a similar VE of 90.4%, as reported in June. Even with EUA filing and production delays in developed markets, NVX-CoV2373 could quickly ascend to a global No. 3 status in the fight against COVID.
Additionally, early data, which is still being culled, appears to indicate the need for booster shots. With some studies suggesting that efficacy for some of the more prominent vaccines begins to wane within six months of the second dose, Novavax could slide in as a key cog on the booster front in developed markets.
But perhaps the most exciting aspect of Novavax is the company's early-stage work on a combination COVID/influenza vaccine. This combo therapy could really separate it from the competition, if it's successful.
As of now, Novavax is shaping up as one of the biggest bargains in the biotech space.
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Coinbase Global: 556% implied sales growth by 2024
A fourth and final large-cap stock with some serious sales growth traction is cryptocurrency exchange and ecosystem Coinbase Global (COIN 2.01%). If you think Coinbase had a stellar year in 2020 with $1.28 billion in full-year sales, just wait till it generates $8.4 billion in full-year revenue in 2024, according to Wall Street's consensus. That's 556% sales growth in just four years.
The excitement surrounding the company has everything to do with the rise of cryptocurrencies. In particular, trading in Bitcoin and Ethereum, the two largest digital currencies by market cap, accounts for a majority of the company's revenue. With Bitcoin significantly outperforming stocks over the past decade and Ethereum making waves in decentralized finance, Coinbase has quickly become the go-to for all things crypto. And its operating results show it.
During the second quarter, it had 8.8 million monthly transacting users, and trading volume on its platform hit $462 billion. For comparison, trading volume in the second quarter of 2020 was $28 billion. Not surprisingly, revenue grew more than tenfold year over year.
For the moment, growth and profitability aren't an issue. However, popular cryptocurrencies have a penchant for wild swings and drawn-out bear markets. If interest in the Big Two were to wane, Coinbase's sales growth would come to a crashing halt, if not reverse.
What's more, there's zero barrier to entry in the crypto brokerage space. Even though Coinbase is the unquestioned most-popular digital currency exchange, transaction fees will likely be weighed down over time as more competition enters the space. Of the four hypergrowth stocks listed here, it's the one with the most tenuous long-term outlook.
