In the third quarter, legendary investor and retired hedge fund manager Stan Druckenmiller's Duquesne Family Office made a new investment in Amazon. That stock purchase attracted a fair amount of attention when it was revealed by his 13F earlier this month.
But there are actually two other e-commerce stocks -- and Amazon copycats -- that Druckenmiller was buying last quarter, and they make up larger positions in his portfolio: Coupang (CPNG 0.45%) and MercadoLibre (MELI +0.91%).
Those online shopping and technology giants, operating in East Asia and Latin America, respectively, are growing like gangbusters. Both appear to be replicating the Amazon model in their markets with great success.
But should you follow Druckenmiller's lead and buy either or both of these stocks today?
NASDAQ: MELI
Key Data Points
Coupang's slow international expansion
Coupang was launched in 2010, but only pivoted to its current business model around a decade ago. Since then, however, it has emerged as the dominant e-commerce platform in South Korea, generating just under $34 billion in revenue over the last 12 months. How? By replicating Amazon's vertically integrated delivery network strategy in its home market.
Customers who pay for Coupang's Prime-like subscription loyalty service can receive the items they order on the same day they buy them, or by 7 a.m. the next day, all with complimentary shipping. Among the categories of goods that customers can get delivered that rapidly are fresh groceries. Returns are also easy: You just leave the item you want to send back in a reusable Coupang box set outside your door. This level of convenience is why Coupang now has 24.7 million active customers in South Korea -- nearly half the population.
The company should keep gaining market share in South Korea, and its revenue per active user grew 7% year over year last quarter. However, Coupang is trying to be much more than an e-commerce and shipping company. It has a food delivery service (Coupang Eats), video streaming, advertising, financial technology investments, a new cloud computing division, and it purchased the fashion marketplace Farfetch in early 2024. Plus, the company has begun expanding in Taiwan, where its revenues are now growing by over 100% year over year.
Image source: Getty Images.
MercadoLibre: More than just e-commerce
MercadoLibre is the leading e-commerce player in Latin America. It operates in many countries, but the vast majority of its revenue comes from three markets: Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina.
It, too, is putting an emphasis on speeding up deliveries to its customers -- and it had 107 million of them during the first nine months of 2025. However, due to Latin America's lagging internet penetration and less robust transportation infrastructure, e-commerce penetration in that region is significantly lower than in East Asia or the United States.
This gives MercadoLibre a long runway to keep expanding. It will require a lot of capital investment, but those outlays should lead to sustained revenue growth over the next decade and beyond. Last quarter, its commerce revenue grew 38% year over year on a currency-neutral basis. Double-digit percentage revenue growth should continue for many years.
What makes MercadoLibre different from some other e-commerce players is its large financial technology (fintech) business. This includes payment processing, its MercadoPago personal finance application, and a growing banking/lending division. That division saw constant-currency revenue growth of 65% last quarter. Overall, MercadoLibre's revenue grew 49% year over year last quarter, making it one of the fastest-growing technology companies worldwide.
CPNG Operating Margin (TTM) data by YCharts.
Should you follow Druckenmiller's lead and buy these two stocks?
Both Coupang and MercadoLibre are fantastic businesses. But that doesn't necessarily mean the stocks are automatic buys. We also need to consider valuation.
Based on the commonly used metric of trailing price-to-earnings ratio (P/E), both stocks look expensive. Coupang has a P/E ratio of 132, while MercadoLibre has a P/E ratio of 50. But these ratios don't consider the long-term earnings power of these companies due to how much they are investing in product expansion and growth opportunities.
MercadoLibre currently has an operating margin of 12%. Given its high-margin and fast-growing fintech division, I'd expect its profit margin to keep marching higher over the long term, perhaps eclipsing 20% a decade from now when the business is more mature.
Given that its revenues are likely to multiply as well, MercadoLibre should be able to grow its net income from its current annualized rate of about $2 billion to well over $10 billion within the next decade. Relative to its current market cap of $100 billion, that would give it a cheap forward P/E ratio of 10.
Coupang has a measly 2% operating margin, but I see it as having the potential to grow its profit margin to 10% or higher over the long term. (It likely won't eclipse MercadoLibre's margin since it doesn't have a fintech segment -- at least not yet.) Based on how its revenue is steadily growing, it is likely that its overall sales will eclipse $50 billion within a few years. Apply a 10% profit margin to that speculative revenue figure, and Coupang's P/E ratio could sink to a cheap level of 10 relative to its current market cap of $50 billion, and perhaps even faster than MercadoLibre.
Don't be fooled by their optically high current P/E ratios: Both MercadoLibre and Coupang are solid buys for long-term retail investors right now.
