We recently published a list of 10 Tech Stocks with High Upside Potential. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Datadog, Inc. (NASDAQ:DDOG) stands against other tech stocks with high upside potential.
As per Forrester Research, Inc., despite persistent inflation, the US real GDP is expected to increase 2.7% in 2025 and the US tech spending is projected to see growth of 6.1% to touch a staggering $2.7 trillion. The software spending in the US is expected to increase by 10.7% in 2025. With the escalation in cybersecurity risks, companies continue to leverage cloud and GenAI technologies to fuel future growth and innovation.
AI to Drive Growth in Tech Sector in 2025
The largest US stocks, also referred to as the Magnificent 7, have seen a strong run over the previous 2 years, mainly due to the buildout of AI infrastructure, says Goldman Sachs. Sung Cho, co-head of US Fundamental Equity in Goldman Sachs Asset Management. Cho believes this buildout can significantly benefit data and security companies, and software companies successfully integrating AI in their existing product set. As the Fed continues to cut rates, the smaller tech companies – which saw contraction in their multiples because of higher rates – might see a favourable macro backdrop.
READ ALSO: 7 Best Stocks to Buy For Long-Term and 8 Cheap Jim Cramer Stocks to Invest In.
Robust AI Investments are On the Horizon
UBS has highlighted how AI has and will continue to drive the growth of the broader technology sector. As per the firm, since the rollout of ChatGPT in November 2022, the total market capitalization of companies listed on the US technology exchange NASDAQ increased to ~US$13.5 trillion. Notably, around two-thirds of this value increase has been directly caused by the AI sector. Moving forward, the decisive factor is expected to be the extent to which significant investments in AI-based infrastructure can be translated into profitable business models.
While highlighting the consensus estimates, UBS stated that the 4 major US technology corporations are projected to invest ~US$280 billion in AI this year. Given the increased usage of this key technology across industries, value creation processes are expected to be optimized. This can lead to significant productivity gains. One such area is the market for robotics and automation, which is expected to reach a sales volume of ~US$350 billion in 2025, says UBS analysts. Notably, humanoid robotics will be the key area of particular interest because of the innovations.
Our Methodology
To list the 10 Tech Stocks with High Upside Potential, we used a screener and shortlisted the stocks catering to the broader technology sector. Next, we filtered out the stocks having an average upside potential of at least ~30%, as of February 28. Finally, the stocks were arranged in ascending order of their average upside potential. We also mentioned the hedge fund sentiments around each stock, as of Q4 2024.
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).
A close-up of a laptop with a software engineer coding on the monitor.
Datadog, Inc. (NASDAQ:DDOG)
Average Upside Potential: ~37.2%
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 83
Datadog, Inc. (NASDAQ:DDOG) is a technology company that specializes in cloud-based monitoring, analytics, and security for modern IT infrastructure. Analyst Andrew Sherman of TD Cowen reiterated a “Buy” rating on the company’s stock, providing a price target of $165.00. The strong performance and promising outlook continue to support the analyst’s buy rating. The analyst has deemed Datadog, Inc. (NASDAQ:DDOG)’s commentary on AI-native systems, log solutions, and sales capacity expansion as optimistic, highlighting further growth potential.
Additionally, the analyst sees revenue guidance as conservative, reflecting strong upside, and noted that the sales and marketing expenses are projected to increase as Datadog, Inc. (NASDAQ:DDOG) ramps up hiring, highlighting robust demand. The management’s emphasis on AI-native solutions and competitive advantages in log management continues to play a crucial role in the favourable outlook. Datadog, Inc. (NASDAQ:DDOG) remains well-placed to benefit from favourable technological trends, including expansion of cloud computing, DevOps, and AI adoption, which continue to fuel demand for real-time monitoring, security and observability solutions.
Brown Capital Management, an investment management company, released its Q3 2024 investor letter. Here is what the fund said:
“Other examples of negative sentiment include portfolio companies that reported earnings that met or exceeded expectations, but only saw their share prices go up slightly, stay flat or even decline. For example, Datadog, Inc. (NASDAQ:DDOG) is a leading SaaS-based, information technology (IT)-monitoring and analytics software platform for developers, IT operations and business users. The platform automates the monitoring of infrastructure, applications databases, networks, logs and security. Datadog’s platform is differentiated by providing a unified view of these systems via a visual interface configured to the needs of each user (i.e., a single pane of glass). Datadog delivered solid operating results in the second quarter of 2024, reporting revenue growth of 27% and raising 2024 full year revenue, operating income and earnings guidance. Despite these solid fundamental results, Datadog’s share price was down 11.8% in the third quarter. We speculate that these market reactions are evidence of the negative environment for high-growth companies. For more, please see the Detractors section below.
Datadog, mentioned above, automates the monitoring of infrastructure, applications databases, networks, logs and security. The company delivered solid operating results in the second quarter of 2024, reporting revenue growth of 27% and raising guidance for 2024 full-year revenue, operating income and earnings. Datadog noted improving consumption and demand trends among its enterprise customers and stabilizing trends among its small and mid-sized customers. On its earnings call, Datadog management disputed that it has interest in large acquisitions, notwithstanding news articles on July 17 that Gitlab was seeking a buyer and Datadog is among the potential suitors. Despite solid fundamental results, Datadog’s share price underperformed in the third quarter of 2024. This may be due to its premium valuation and investor worries about Datadog’s ability to sustain its current strong revenue growth in a softer economic environment. We remain confident in Datadog’s ability to deliver durable growth over the long term. We believe Datadog has a massive and underpenetrated total addressable market that is growing about 10% annually. We also believe Datadog has a strong competitive positioning in infrastructure monitoring and is gaining market share.”
Overall, DDOG ranks 6th on our list of tech stocks with high upside potential. While we acknowledge the potential of DDOG 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 time frame. If you are looking for a deeply undervalued AI stock that is more promising than DDOG but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.
