5 Tech Stocks to Buy According to Billionaire Philippe Laffont

In this article, we discuss the top 5 tech stocks to buy according to billionaire Philippe Laffont. To read the detailed history and analysis of Coatue Management’s portfolio, go directly to 10 Tech Stocks to Buy According to Billionaire Philippe Laffont.

5. Block, Inc. (NYSE:SQ)

Coatue Management’s Stake: $678.436 million

Block, Inc. (NYSE:SQ) reported its first quarter 2023 results on May 5, reporting an EPS of $0.40 compared to $0.32 estimates and also outperforming the revenue estimates of $4.5 billion after generating $5 billion. The company updated its guidance after strong Q1 results and expects 2023 adjusted EBITDA of $1.36 billion compared to the prior $1.30 billion outlook. Previously, Block, Inc. (NYSE:SQ) was expecting an adjusted operating loss of $150 million and now expects it to be $115 million.

Coatue Management’s increased its stake in Block, Inc. (NYSE:SQ) by 84% and held 9.88 million of the company shares valued at $678.436 million in the first quarter of 2023.

4. Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD)

Coatue Management’s Stake: $833.787 million

Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD) is an American semiconductor and consumer electronics company headquartered in California.

Coatue Management increased its holdings in Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD) by 51% in the first quarter of 2023 to 8.5 million shares worth $833.787 million, covering 5.54% of the hedge fund’s portfolio.

Here is what Baron Funds had to say about Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD) in its Q4 2022 investor letter:

“During the quarter, we added to our position in Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMD), a global fabless semiconductor company focusing on high performance computing technology, software, and products. AMD designs leading high-performance central and graphics processing units (known as CPUs and GPUs) and integrates them with hardware and software to build differentiated solutions for customers. While the company is seeing weakness in its PC business in the short term, we continue to believe AMD will be one of the lead beneficiaries of growing data center infrastructure spending driven by expanded use cases for AI and cloud computing across its product portfolio. AMD’s largest share gain opportunity is in its data-center-server CPUs, which continue to take share from incumbent Intel given a superior total cost of ownership proposition driven by better performance per watt of energy consumption across many computing workloads. We also believe Xilinx, a recent acquisition, offers AMD diversification opportunities through which it can benefit from the broader proliferation of semiconductors into all aspects of the industrial and consumer economies.”

3. Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)

Coatue Management’s Stake: $909.88

Coatue Management’s doubled its stake in the tech giant Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) in the first quarter of 2023 to 3.156 million shares worth $909.88 million, making up 6.04% of the hedge fund’s portfolio.

On May 24, Mizuho analyst Gregg Moskowitz reaffirmed a Buy rating on Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) shares and raised his price target to $340 from $325. The analyst raised the company’s price target after attending the first day of the Microsoft Build conference and said that the event was “AI-heavy.”

In the first quarter of 2023, 289 hedge funds held Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)’s stock compared to 259 in the previous quarter. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Trust was the most prominent hedge fund holder in the first quarter with over 39 million shares worth $11.32 billion.

Fred Alger Management made the following comment about Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) in its Q1 2023 investor letter:

“Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) is a beneficiary of corporate America’s transformative digitization. Microsoft’s CEO expects technology spending as a percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to jump from about 5% now to 10% in 10 years and that Microsoft will continue to capture market share within the technology sector. The company operates through three segments: Productivity and Business Processes (Office. LinkedIn, and Dynamics), Intelligent Cloud (Server Products and Cloud Services. Azure, and Enterprise Services), and More Personal Computing (Windows Devices, Gaming, and Search). While the company reported decent fiscal second quarter results, their investment in OpenAl’s ChatGPT captured the attention of investors. contributing to positive performance. Throughout the quarter. Microsoft surprised investors with continual rollouts of new Al capabilities across the company’s portfolio (e.g., Bing, GitHub. Teams, Office 365). Furthermore, the company announced Microsoft 365 Copilot, which leverages GPT-4, a large language model, combined with the Microsoft Graph of data to provide Al virtual assistance. We believe Microsoft’s investment in OpenAl provides a first-mover advantage in the Al transformer model space. Despite challenges in the early days of Al-powered applications, the pace of Al innovation is faster than any other enterprise technology previously observed, in our view.”

2. NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA)

Coatue Management’s Stake:$1.383 billion 

NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) is an American technology company focusing on computer hardware/software, semiconductors, consumer electronics, and GPUs, among other things. The company represented 9.19% of Coatue Management’s portfolio with 4.98 billion shares valued at $1.383 billion. 

Fred Alger Management made the following comment about NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) in its Q1 2023 investor letter:

“NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA) is a leading supplier of graphics processing units (GPUs) for a variety of end markets, such as gaming, PCs, data centers, virtual reality and high-performance computing. The company is leading in most secular growth categories in computing, and especially artificial intelligence and super-computing parallel processing techniques for solving complex computational problems. Simply put. Nvidia’s computational power is a critical enabler of Al and therefore critical to Al adoption, in our view. As such, we believe Nvidia is a long-term high unit volume growth opportunity. During the period, NVIDIA reported fiscal fourth-quarter results that met expectations, as the company navigated. through an inventory correction associated with the broad macroeconomic slowdown. Moreover, management gave fiscal year earnings guidance that was better than analyst estimates. noting strong year-over-year growth in gaming and data centers. Management’s constructive assessment of 2023 prospects. coupled with the rapid rollout and adoption of generative Al offerings, led to positive share price performance.”

1. Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Coatue Management’s Stake: $1.7 billion

Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)’s focus on generative AI has proved significant for the company. The stock is up 114% year-to-date. Moreover, Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)’s Reality Labs is also working on virtual and augmented reality advancements.

Artisan Partners made the following comment about Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) in its Q1 2023 investor letter:

“Our top contributors in Q1 were Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META), Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) and FedEx. Following sharp declines in 2022, shares of Meta Platforms have more than doubled since their early November 2022 lows. Last year’s drawdown created a highly favorable risk-reward, which we took advantage of by adding to our position. Management has wisely, in our view, recalibrated its spending plans to focus on profitability amid a weaker advertising environment, increased TikTok competition and Apple’s privacy changes. While investors got ahead of themselves back in 2021, extrapolating pandemic growth rates into the future, Meta is still a highly successful enterprise generating over $120 billion of revenue annually on a run-rate basis and has more than $40 billion in cash on its balance sheet to help it navigate its future course. Recent usage and engagement trends for Facebook and Instagram have been positive, and Reels—Meta’s answer to TikTok—is gaining traction.”

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