15 Best Hardware Stocks According To Goldman Sachs

7. QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM)

Number of Hedge Fund Shareholders In Q1 2024: 78

QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM) is a key player in the smartphone industry because of its CPUs, GPUs, neural processors, and other chips. This also makes it a key AI stock as QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM)’s Arm based products are also being used in consumer notebooks. AI and QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM) were also at the heart of a May 2024 analyst note by BofA that saw the bank raise the share price target to $245 from $180 and stick to a Buy rating. BofA believes that QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM) could secure as much as a 70% market share of the AI PC market, and also benefit from a recovery in the Chinese market and on device AI processing for smartphones.

However, even though it might benefit from future AI trends, QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM)’s stability that enables it to regularly ship thousands of products worldwide and earn licensing revenue is also reflected in a 18.40 forward P/E ratio. This is lower than the market’s 21, and shows muted investor growth expectations. Madison Investments mentioned QUALCOMM Incorporated (NASDAQ:QCOM) in its fourth quarter of 2023 investor letter where it shared:

Qualcomm also reported a solid fourth fiscal quarter with better than expected results. The company guided the first quarter ahead of expectations despite headwinds from Samsung as the inventory headwinds dissipate. Qualcomm remains well positioned in the mobile handset market and should benefit as Artificial Intelligence moves to edge devices which could drive an upgrade cycle.