Growth stocks have suffered the steepest declines in the recent stock market sell-off. It's not hard to see why: Shares of companies growing faster than average enjoy a premium, and therefore also often get dumped quickly when fear and uncertainty loom large. Right now, sky-high inflation, rising interest rates, and fears of a recession have formed the perfect recipe for disaster for growth stocks.
Such market downturns, however, are also the best times to buy top-notch growth stocks while they're still languishing. With only $1,000, here are two such tempting hot growth stocks with humongous catalysts ahead you could buy right away.
The most hard-hit growth stock is also the most attractive now
Shopify (SHOP -2.04%) made a killing during the COVID-19 pandemic, as lockdowns forced people to stay at home and shop online. Since Shopify's cloud-based platform allows merchants of all sizes to set up customized digital stores and manage everything from inventory to sales from one platform, demand for the company's offerings from merchants as well as consumers boomed during the pandemic.
Growth has slowed dramatically since, while the threat of competition has gone up. The dual factor sent Shopify stock crashing, and it's now down more than 80% from its all-time highs.
Shopify, though, is more than just an online platform connecting buyers and sellers, and the market is paying no heed to the company's offerings, its growth moves to tackle the competition, and the size of its addressable market.
For example, merchants on Shopify can sell not only through a variety of social media platforms, thanks to the company's enviable list of tie-ups, but also directly to end consumers. Shopify offers a host of services for merchants, including financing, payments processing, and inventory management.
Most importantly, what started off as a platform for entrepreneurs now caters to small, medium, and large enterprises through Shopify's business-to-business (B2B) offerings. B2B, in particular, has significantly expanded the size of Shopify's total addressable market to nearly $160 billion.
In another significant growth move, Shopify recently acquired Deliverr to offer Amazon-like one- and two-day deliveries. While the acquisition could add to Shopify's losses in the coming quarters as the company integrates Deliverr into its operations, it could turn out to be a winning move in the long run.
If you can look beyond Shopify's near-term challenges and the market's pessimism, Shopify looks like the kind of growth stock that's just waiting to take off, what with its growing merchant base, gross merchandise volume, and top line.
This hot EV stock looks primed to rebound in 2022
Another growth stock that looks set to take off is Nio (NIO -5.35%), the China-based electric vehicle (EV) maker that has its plate full for the rest of 2022. I've been pounding the table on Nio for several months now, as despite the company's sluggish margins and macroeconomic concerns in China, demand for Nio's vehicles is intact and its top line is growing steadily. In its second quarter, for example, Nio's deliveries and revenue rose 14% and 22%, respectively, year over year.
The problem is high input costs and supply constraints, but these challenges are hurting nearly every automaker right now. So while the markets are harping on these near-term blips, Nio is expanding production, launching new EVs, and even snapping up lithium assets as prices of the key raw material head for the skies.
As scheduled, Nio has just started deliveries of its much-awaited midsize sedan, the ET5, that'll compete with Tesla's Model 3 in China. By December, Nio expects monthly sales of the ET5 to exceed 10,000 units. To put that into perspective, Nio's total deliveries across the four existing models it currently sells was 25,059 units in the second quarter.
The ET5 could therefore be a game-changer for Nio and hugely boost its deliveries and sales. Meanwhile, Nio is rapidly expanding production of its ET7 sedan, which it began selling in March. Since the ET7 is a premium sedan, higher deliveries should boost Nio's margins as its sales mix improves.
What's more, Nio even expects supply bottlenecks for all of three its new launches -- the ET7, ET5, and SUV ES7 -- to ease in October. That means there's a high probability that Nio's margins will improve in the coming quarters. This is crucial, as low margins have been a major overhang on Nio's stock in recent quarters.
With Nio also preparing to launch all three new models in Europe in October and its overall deliveries on pace to hit record highs in the fourth quarter, it could only be a matter of time before this once-hot growth stock takes off again.
