The stock market never moves in the same direction all at once. Different investing sectors get attention from different investors at different times. Technology stocks were all the rage a few years ago, but they've primarily grown out of favor since last year.
Today, you can find several nifty tech stocks trading at reasonable valuations if you're a long-term investor with the patience to give the companies time to grow and compound your wealth.
Want to be more specific? Try digging into Meta Platforms (META -2.41%), Palantir Technologies (PLTR 1.38%), and Salesforce (CRM 0.53%). These three stocks could lift your portfolio over the coming months and years.
1. Meta Platforms: Generative AI could be a game-changer for advertising
Meta Platforms dominates the social media landscape; its app family, which includes Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, collectively has 3.88 billion monthly active users. Threads, another of Meta's social platforms, is brand new and doesn't factor into that total yet. Meta makes most of its revenue from selling ads to brands, which market to the social apps' user bases.
According to Statista's Market Insights, ad spending on social media is expected to grow from $146 billion to $262 billion by 2028, a 79% increase over the next five years. Meta is already the industry's major player due to its dominance of social media. That could only grow as competitor X (formerly Twitter) deals with advertiser concerns regarding X's content moderation. Snap has seen its revenue growth flatline despite increasing its user base.
Additionally, Meta is rolling out artificial intelligence (AI)-powered tools to help stoke engagement on its apps and for advertisers to market better. For example, the company created photo-realistic chatbots modeled after celebrities, like one that resembles Kendall Jenner. Advertisers are gaining tools to help create and optimize their ads. Meta believes the tools could save advertisers a month of work over a year.
Taking these AI tools to foster engagement and better serve ads, mixed with a growing industry, could bode well for Meta over the long term. The company's earnings could grow by 21% annually over the coming years, which makes the stock an enticing investment idea at a forward P/E of 23. Its modest PEG ratio of just over 1 signals that the stock might be a bargain for the growth you could see.
2. Palantir: Demand should remain strong for its services
Palantir Technologies has become a core partner with the United States government. While much of the focus rightfully falls on the company's growth opportunities with commercial clients, it built its business on government partnerships. The company's Gotham platform specializes in government applications, ranging from intelligence to real-time decision-making in operations.
Government spending contributes more than half, about 56% of Palantir's total revenue. The military and defense for America and its allies is a big part of that. The unfortunate reality of global politics means government business could remain crucial to Palantir, especially after the ongoing events in Europe and the Middle East.
Without global peace, it looks like the government will continue to need Palantir's services to help operate at its highest level. Recently, the U.S. Army awarded Palantir a contract worth up to $250 million through 2026 for AI model training and machine learning. Analysts believe Palantir's earnings could grow by an annual average of 57%, making the stock an intriguing idea at a forward P/E of 75 and a PEG ratio of 1.3.
3. Salesforce: A maturing company, but it still has growth left
Investors often like to focus on the latest and greatest Wall Street has to offer, which means excellent companies like Salesforce sometimes get overlooked. Salesforce is a pioneer; it was one of the first companies to adopt a software-as-a-service (SaaS) business model, which sells software products on a subscription plan. The company's customer relationship management software is the world's largest, with over 150,000 customers.
Salesforce has expanded its ecosystem over time to cover additional roles in a business, like marketing and sales. It acquired Slack for collaboration, Tableau for analytics, and MuleSoft for automating. Salesforce still has a lot of growth ahead; not only can it upsell new products to its massive customer base, but management expects its market opportunity to grow as more companies use digital software and tools.
Analysts believe the company's earnings will grow by an average of 22% annually, and the stock trades at a forward P/E of just 25. That's a PEG ratio of just over 1, a sign that the stock is a bargain for the earnings growth you could see.
