We recently compiled a list of the 15 AI News Investors Should Not Miss. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) stands against the other AI stocks investors should not miss.
On October 31, CNBC’s Steve Kovach joined ‘Money Movers’ to discuss big tech’s AI spending. Kovach observes that, apart from ChatGPT, no other AI product has achieved a breakthrough, despite ongoing efforts from many companies. Currently, most of the money is going to chip makers and cloud businesses, and there is no evidence of meaningful sales or engagement around AI products that people may want to use every day. Kovach’s observation implies that tech giants continue to invest heavily in foundational AI advancements and that high-engagement consumer products may still have time to launch. Additionally, many of these big tech companies have reported that they will continue to step up their already high spending on AI infrastructure.
READ ALSO: 15 AI News You Should Not Miss and Top 10 Trending AI Stocks in Q4.
For many like Kovach, OpenAI represents the leading and most mainstream AI breakthrough, with each of its moves highly anticipated. After all, the company is widely credited for bringing artificial intelligence tools into widespread use. In its latest breakthrough, OpenAI has launched “ChatGPT Search”, the company’s new search engine, positioning the high-powered AI startup to compete with search engines like Bing, Perplexity, and Google. This search feature within ChatGPT provides up-to-the-minute sports scores, stock quotes, weather, and more, driven by real-time web searches and partnerships with news and data providers.
“I find it to be a way faster/easier way to get the information I’m looking for. I think we’ll see this especially for queries that require more complex research. I also look forward to a future where a search query can dynamically render a custom web page in response!”
– Sam Altman said in a Reddit AMA on Thursday.
In a notable advancement towards more accessible AI products and services, SpotAI, a leader in AI camera systems, announced the launch of its Video AI Agents. The announcement strives to bring agentic AI capabilities from the digital to the physical world. These agents assist organizations in identifying and resolving incidents, offering measurable ROI in sectors such as manufacturing, education, retail, and automotive services; all without the need for human intervention.
In a similar development within the AI landscape, OSARO, a global leader in machine-learning-enabled robotics for high-volume fulfillment centers, has launched OSARO AutoModel. The OSARO AutoModel allows robots to automatically learn and adapt to new items, processes, and workflows with zero downtime; unlike previous robots that need updating for new SKUs.
Continuing the trend of leveraging artificial intelligence in our increasingly AI-driven world, Bolster, a leader in multi-channel phishing protection, announced on Thursday its newest feature called Bolster AI Security for Email. The Bolster AI Security for Email automates the analysis and mitigation of cyber threats reported through customer abuse mailboxes. The new feature combines crowdsourced customer reports and AI-driven automation to protect brands from fraud schemes in real-time.
Our Methodology
For this article, we selected AI stocks by going through news articles, stock analysis, and press releases. These stocks are also popular among hedge funds.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
A development team working together to create the next version of Windows.
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 279
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) is an American multinational technology company engaged in the development and selling of software, services, and hardware. It is one of Wall Street’s favorite AI stocks, known for investing heavily in new AI initiatives, its significant investment in OpenAI, and its expanding cloud computing infrastructure.
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) reported its fiscal first-quarter earnings after the bell on October 30, 2024. The company beat top and bottom lines on the back of its cloud business and Office software, with AI leading to gains in its Azure cloud platform. Revenue was $65.6 billion, an increase of 16% and beating analysts’ expectations of $64.57 billion, while net income rose 11% to $24.7 billion. The company’s cloud service sales came at $38.9 billion versus expectations of $38.1 billion. Meanwhile, its Intelligent Cloud segment, including its Azure business, raked in $24.1 billion in the quarter, up 20% year over year. However, guidance for the current quarter projects revenue between $68.1 billion and $69.1 billion, suggesting 10.6% growth but falling short of analyst expectations of $69.83 billion. This is largely due to delays from outside suppliers in delivering data center infrastructure, hampering its ability to meet demand.
“AI-driven transformation is changing work, work artifacts, and workflow across every role, function, and business process. We are expanding our opportunity and winning new customers as we help them apply our AI platforms and tools to drive new growth and operating leverage.”
– Satya Nadella, chairman and chief executive officer of Microsoft.
Overall MSFT ranks 1st on our list of the AI stocks investors should not miss. While we acknowledge the potential of MSFT as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than MSFT but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.