We recently compiled a list of the 20 Best Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stocks to Buy According to Analysts. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Coherent Corp. (NYSE:COHR) stands against the other AI stocks.
Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2025 revolved around AI. If not, it’s all that exhibitors could show. Talking about the highlight of the show, it was undoubtedly the keynote from Jensen Huang. The keynote included new products to advance gaming, autonomous vehicles, robotics, and agentic AI. Huang kicked off his talk by reflecting on the company’s 3-decade journey. Later on, he highlighted several significant advancements.
Takeaways From CEO Jensen Huang’s Keynote at CES 2025
As per Huang, AI has been advancing at an ‘incredible pace.’ It started with perception AI, meaning understanding images, words, and sounds. Then it came to generative AI, meaning creating text, images, and sound. And now, it’s the era of physical AI, meaning AI that can proceed, reason, plan, and act. The AI giant introduced GeForce RTX 50 Series GPUs, which are powered by Blackwell architecture. These GPUs provide significant improvements in AI-driven rendering, enhancing gaming and creative workflows. Furthermore, Huang unveiled “Cosmos,” which is a suite of foundational AI models capable of generating photorealistic video. The models have been designed in such a way that train robots and automated systems more efficiently, further advancing robotics and autonomous technologies.
The company and its partners have rolled out AI Blueprints for agentic AI, which includes PDF-to-podcast for efficient research and video search and summarization for assessing significant quantities of video and images — allowing developers to build, test, and run AI agents anywhere.
Agentic AI- Road Ahead in 2025
TechInformed interviewed experts from leading technology companies to explore predictions about Agentic AI. As per Steven Webb, UK chief technology and innovation officer, Capgemini, 2025 will see wider adoption of small language models (SLMs) and AI agents as an era of Agentic AI is fast approaching. Using multiple SLMs throughout a toolchain is expected to play a critical role in the AI evolution. This will include going beyond the already familiar LLMs such as GPT.
Furthermore, Alan Jacobson (chief data and analytics officer at Alteryx) believes that 2025 will see the rise of Gen AI agents used to solve problems. This is an approach that is made possible by reducing costs and improving the performance and speed of LLMs. Frameworks for orchestrating Agentic AI work are expected to emerge. Notably, a large percentage of use cases are expected to start to employ this approach.
Our Methodology
To list the 20 Best Artificial Intelligence (AI) Stocks to Buy According to Analysts, we conducted extensive research and sifted through numerous online rankings. After getting an initial list of 25-30 stocks, we chose the ones that were popular among hedge funds and that analysts saw upside to. Finally, the stocks were arranged in ascending order of their average upside potential, as of 14th January. We also mentioned hedge fund sentiments around each stock, as of Q3 2024.
At Insider Monkey we are obsessed with 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 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
A row of precision industrial lasers in action, cutting the most intricate of shapes.
Coherent Corp. (NYSE:COHR)
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 51
Average Upside Potential: 29.03%
Coherent Corp. (NYSE:COHR) is engaged in making optical circuit switches for AI data centers, as the growth of AI and ML technologies continues to create significant needs for data processing. Notably, well-established AI giant Nvidia happens to be one of the company’s transceiver customers. In Q1 2025, Coherent Corp. (NYSE:COHR) saw its revenue coming at $1.35 billion, reflecting an increase of 28% YoY, thanks to the AI demand. The company’s focus on leveraging AI presents significant growth opportunities.
Notably, AI integration is expected to develop more advanced, efficient semiconductor products, potentially opening new market segments or applications. Also, AI-driven analytics are expected to optimize equipment maintenance schedules, which can help reduce downtime and improve production consistency. Morgan Stanley upped its price target on the company’s shares to $120 from $100, keeping an “Equal Weight” rating.
Invesco Distributors, Inc., an investment management firm, released its Q3 2024 investor letter. Here is what the fund said:
“Coherent Corp. (NYSE:COHR): This laser company develops and manufactures optoelectronic components and devices used in the communications, electronics and industrial markets. The company has been benefiting from growing awareness of an improved growth outlook driven by artificial intelligence (AI), given that its optical transceivers are key enablers for networking of AI servers.”
Overall COHR ranks 16th on our list of the best AI stocks to buy according to analysts. While we acknowledge the potential of COHR as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some deeply undervalued AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for a deeply undervalued AI stock that is more promising than AI but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
READ NEXT: 8 Best Wide Moat Stocks to Buy Now and 30 Most Important AI Stocks According to BlackRock.
Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
