Marquee stocks get a lot of attention. But although some are fine choices, they often provide more value than growth potential. When they're big, there's only so much higher they can reach.

Although it's important to have established winners as part of a diversified portfolio, it's just as important to find up-and-comers, because they have wide-open opportunities and could add serious growth to your holdings. Two top choices today are Lemonade (LMND 1.64%) and MercadoLibre (MELI 3.09%).

1. Lemonade: Turning lemons into a huge revenue-generating business

Lemonade was a star initial public offering in 2021. It has all the elements of a great disruptor, with its digital insurance business that's based on artificial intelligence (AI) and gives leftover policy funds to charity.

But while it's growing as fast as investors would expect, it's taking too long to improve its loss ratio and become profitable. Weary investors see near-term opportunities elsewhere, and they've sent Lemonade's price down 90% from its highs.

But the growth story still looks compelling, and profitability metrics, including the loss ratio, are improving across the board. In the 2023 second quarter, in-force premiums increased 18% over last year, and revenue increased 55%.

Customers continue to sign up for policies, and its customer count is nearing 2 million. They're also buying more policies and more-expensive policies, which means Lemonade's strategy of upselling and cross-selling is working; the premium per customer increased 6% over last year.

The loss ratio was 83%, or an 11-point improvement from last year. While this number has been erratic over the past two years and is probably the main reason investors haven't been pleased, management went into great detail in the recent shareholder letter to explain that its AI-based algorithms are working, but since it's a young company, it will take time to get them working at top speed. When it does, though, Lemonade could have an unparalleled edge over legacy insurers.

At the current price, the stock trades at about 3 times trailing-12-month sales. At this valuation, and with its growing revenue and improving metrics, it might finally be time to buy shares. As the market continues to rise, and investors become more confident, Lemonade could soar.

2. MercadoLibre: Much more than e-commerce

MercadoLibre continues to dominate e-commerce in Latin America while expanding its business and generating higher profits. It's an unstoppable stock with huge opportunities and top-notch execution.

It experienced some deceleration in the post-lockdown period when most e-commerce retailers felt the impact of customers going back to stores. But for MercadoLibre, that meant high double-digit percentage growth instead of triple digits. That trend is now reversing, and e-commerce has reaccelerated.

In the 2023 third quarter, sales increased 69% over last year, and gross merchandise volume (GMV) rose 59%. MercadoLibre is improving its logistics business with faster delivery, which leads to a cycle of higher consumer engagement, loyalty, and more revenue.

The number of orders delivered either on the same day or next day increased by 22% year over year in the second quarter and 5% over last quarter, and 80% of total orders were delivered within two days.

Management gave an update this week that this year was its biggest Black Friday event ever, with GMV increasing 80% over last year. It's committed to dominating in e-commerce, and it hired 7,200 temporary workers to ensure that it could meet its high fulfillment goals even with the deluge of orders.

Just like Amazon, which it resembles in many ways, MercadoLibre recently launched a new membership program called MELI+ that comes with streaming subscriptions and free shipping for an annual fee. That should also boost loyalty and sales.

While there's no question that e-commerce remains the main part of its business and is still demonstrating robust growth, MercadoLibre's newer fintech business has even stronger momentum. Total payment volume (TPV) increased 121% over last year in the third quarter, with off-platform TPV accelerating in its three largest markets of Argentina, Mexico, and Brazil.

This business, which allows shoppers to use MercadoLibre's payment platform to pay for other purchases, is still in its infancy. It surpassed on-platform TPV in Mexico for the first time in the third quarter, and there's ongoing potential in this high-growth segment.

MercadoLibre stock is up 90% this year, but there's tons more to go. Don't miss this opportunity.