On April 7, Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities joined CNBC’s ‘Squawk on the Street’ to discuss how the current tariff environment could impact tech supply chains. Musk’s actions and Trump’s tariffs have contributed to broad economic uncertainty, which Ives also referred to as the economic Armageddon for US tech in an earlier conversation. He expressed concern about the structural supply chain challenges posed by recent tariffs and geopolitical tensions. Ives highlighted that the US tech sector has historically maintained an edge over China but this could be wiped out if manufacturing were relocated to the US. The logistical hurdles of building manufacturing plants in the US are not negligible and it would take 4 to 5 years to establish facilities capable of sustaining production levels comparable to those in Asia.
He also acknowledged that he hasn’t downgraded major stocks like the ones in MAG7 but remains cautious. If these previously highlighted issues persist for months, Ives anticipates drastic cuts in earnings. This uncertainty surrounding tariffs could lead to lower demand for emerging technologies like AI and cybersecurity. He explained that this situation could severely impact the US tech companies and lead to broader cuts across the tech sector — potentially up to 25% in earnings. He also criticized Elon Musk’s political involvement, which he believes has caused permanent damage to his brand and customer base. He estimated a 20% demand destruction in Europe and 10% in the US.
While Ives remains cautious on tech, we’re here with a list of the 13 NASDAQ stocks with the highest upside potential.
A successful investor reviewing the NASDAQ-100 Index® portfolio on a touchscreen monitor.
Our Methodology
We used the Finviz stock screener to select the 13 stocks with the highest analysts’ upside potential (at least 35%) as of April 8. The stocks are ranked in ascending order of their upside potential. We have also added the hedge fund sentiment for each stock, as of Q4 2024, which was sourced from Insider Monkey’s database.
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 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).
13 NASDAQ Stocks with the Highest Upside Potential
13. Booking Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:BKNG)
Average Upside Potential as of April 8: 36.05%
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 99
Booking Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:BKNG) offers global online and traditional travel and restaurant reservations and related services. It primarily operates Booking.com, which offers online accommodation reservations. It also operates Priceline, Agoda, Kayak, OpenTable, and Rentalcars.com, for services like discount travel reservations, rental car reservation services, and vacation packages.
This is the world’s largest travel company with platform sales of over $165 billion. It enables the creation of seamless and customized travel experiences by bringing together all aspects of travel planning and booking onto a single platform through connected trip vision. Transactions in this segment grew by over 45% year-over-year in Q4 2024. This was a high single-digit percentage of the total transaction growth. Analysts now project overall growth to slow down to 6.6% in 2025 before rebounding to 8.8% in 2026.
This was fueled by the company’s flight offerings, as traveler bookings grew by 38% year-over-year to make up around 50 million airline tickets for the full year 2024. The Genius Royalty program, which offers rewards for frequent travelers, is an integral part of this growth. Travelers in the higher tiers made up over 30% of the company’s active travelers. Booking Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:BKNG) is integrating GenAI in such offerings to further improve efficiency and feedback.
12. Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)
Average Upside Potential as of April 8: 39.42%
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 166
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is popular for its consumer electronics which include iPhones, Macs, iPads, AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watches, and other wearables. It also offers AppleCare support & cloud services and the App Store. It also has various subscription-based services that range from Apple Arcade for game subscriptions to Apple Fitness+ for personalized fitness services.
In FQ1 2025, the company achieved a record revenue of $124.3 billion, which marked a 4% year-over-year increase. It also set revenue records across major markets, such as the Americas, Europe, and the Asia Pacific. The company’s Services segment revenue particularly reached an all-time high of $26.3 billion, which was up by 14%. For FQ2 2025, the company expects Services revenue to see low double-digit growth.
However, on April 8, Wedbush lowered the price target on Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) to $250 from $325, while maintaining an Outperform rating, due to the current market uncertainty surrounding tariffs. But the firm still maintains the company as a top-tier investment and thinks that the current volatility may create buying opportunities for oversold tech companies. Earlier in February, the company also made a $500 billion pledge over 4 years to create 20,000 new jobs in engineering, R&D, manufacturing, and AI, which fuels investor confidence.
