10 Best Stocks to Buy and Hold for 20 Years

3. Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 234

Morningstar gave a wide moat rating on Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL), which stems from its intangible assets, network effect, cost advantage, and customer switching costs. As per the firm, Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)’s advertising business happens to be a cash-generating machine. Together with advertising, the company continues to make progress on diversifying cash generation, with Google Cloud and YouTube subscription sales regarded as additional FCF drivers, opines Morningstar. Over the next few decades, the company’s search business can continue to sustain its dominance in the broader industry.

Even Morningstar analyst Ahmed Khan lauded Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)’s search engine business, which tends to utilise significant amounts of data it garners to improve search results and the targeting of adverts. The analyst believes that it’s difficult to overstate the dominance of this business, even though there are potential threats such as AI search and Tik-Tok. Justin Post, an analyst from Bank of America Securities, has expressed optimism around the company’s stock. As per the analyst, Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)’s advancements in AI and strategic investments in AI-related technologies can result in new monetization opportunities. Also, the introduction of the Gemini app, as well as its emphasis on operational efficiency, aids its growth prospects.