In this article, we’re going to look at the 5 best cloud stocks to buy now. To see more stocks and get a better understanding about why you should invest in the cloud industry, head over to 12 best cloud stocks to buy now.
5. Adobe Inc (NASDAQ:ADBE)
Another stock that made the list of the best cloud stocks to buy now is Adobe Inc (NASDAQ:ADBE). Known for its suite of products used for creation and publication of content, Adobe Inc (NASDAQ:ADBE) more than a decade ago embarked on a journey to transform itself into a cloud-based provider of software and services. In the last quarter, Adobe Inc (NASDAQ:ADBE)’s Creative Cloud generated revenue of $2.91 billion and its document cloud delivered $685 million in revenue. All in all, Adobe Inc (NASDAQ:ADBE) reported EPS of $4.10 and revenue of $4.89 billion, beating the estimates by $0.12 and $23 million, respectively.
During the third quarter of 2023, Adobe Inc (NASDAQ:ADBE) saw an increase in popularity among hedge funds in our database. In this way, 112 funds reported bullish stakes in the company as of the end of September, up by three over the quarter.
4. Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM)
Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) is a cloud-based provider of software that helps other organizations with customer relationship management, sales, marketing automation, and analytics. The company generates its revenue from two segments, with the lion’s share coming from subscription and support, which includes its enterprise cloud services. For the fiscal quarter ended July 31, Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) reported revenue of $8.6 billion, with $8.0 billion originating from the subscription and support segment.
During the second quarter, the number of investors bullish on Salesforce Inc (NYSE:CRM) remained unchanged at 122, but the total value of their holdings appreciated to $10.51 billion from $7.19 billion.
3. Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL)
And of course we cannot talk about the best cloud stocks to buy now without mentioning the well-known tech behemoths: Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL), Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), and Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT), which also rank among the most popular stocks among hedge funds. In Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL), there were 221 funds with bullish positions at the end of September, holding in aggregate $26.16 billion in shares.
Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) posted a total revenue of $76.69 billion for the third quarter. The bulk of the revenue, $68 billion, was generated by Google Services (which includes Search and YouTube), but Google Cloud should also not be overlooked as it added $8.4 billion to Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL)’s top line. Also it’s worth mentioning that while the Services segment saw a revenue growth of around 10%, Google Cloud revenue grew by more than 20% over the year.
2. Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN)
Then there’s Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), which saw the number of funds with bullish stakes grow to 286 from 278 during the third quarter, while the aggregate value of their holdings increased to $38.90 billion from $34.90 billion.
Even though Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) is known as the largest eCommerce company, it is also one of the leaders in cloud computing, with its Amazon Web Services platform being used by many organizations that require cloud infrastructure. According to some estimates, AWS controls over 30% of the cloud infrastructure market.
In this way, AWS is the company’s third-largest segment in terms of sales. Out of total revenue of $143 billion recorded in the third quarter, $57.3 billion were generated by the online stores, followed by third-party seller services ($34.3 billion), and AWS which generated $23 billion in revenue. AWS also saw a revenue growth of 12% over the year.
1. Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT)
Last but not least, Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) tops our list of the best cloud stocks to buy now and it’s actually the most popular stock among hedge funds tracked by Insider Monkey. At the end of September, there were 306 funds holding shares of the tech giant with a total value of $72.19 billion, up from 300 funds and $69.79 billion, respectively, a quarter earlier.
Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT)’s cloud infrastructure platform Azure is the second-largest by market share, preceded by Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN)’s AWS and followed by Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL)’s Google Cloud. The company is also providing its popular Office productivity products as a cloud-based software. For the third quarter of 2023, Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ:MSFT) reported revenue of $56.52 billion. From this, the company said that its Microsoft Cloud revenue (which includes Azure, Office 365 and other cloud products and services) amounted to $31.8 billion, up from $25.7 billion in the same quarter of the last year.
