We recently published a list of 11 Best Internet Retail Stocks to Buy According to Analysts. In this article, we are going to take a look at where PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD) stands against other best internet retail stocks to buy according to analysts.
Retail Sales Rise in March Amid Volatile Stock Market
Trade policies and tariffs have dominated the stock market since the beginning of April, resulting in volatility and uncertainty. However, CNBC reported on April 16 that retail sales rose 1.4% in March, surpassing expectations. CNBC reported earlier on April 15 that the March retail sales report had the potential to impact investor positioning and confidence. According to Dow Jones, economists and experts anticipated a 1.2% month-over-month growth.
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CNBC reported that the primary catalyst for this growth is a pull-forward of consumer spending to get ahead of increased good prices brought about by tariffs. It also reported that Freedom Capital Markets chief global strategist Jay Woods opined that retail stocks could undergo a short-term bounce if the retail sales report were in line or better than expected. He said:
“Some of these names have gotten way too far ahead of themselves on the downside that bounces are natural. They’ve gotten beaten down and mean reversion could lead to a nice rally over the coming days.”
Callie Cox, chief market strategist of Ritholtz Wealth Management, expressed similar sentiments, saying a strong retail sales report could potentially lead to a rise in consumer discretionary stocks.
“Consumer Discretionary stocks have been hit so hard that they may be more susceptible to a relief rally on the back of a retail sales report that doesn’t show the economy is falling apart,” said Cox.
With the retail sales report exceeding expectations, these analyst opinions could potentially come true. So let’s look at the 11 best internet retail stocks to buy according to analysts.
Our Methodology
We sifted through stock screeners, financial media reports, and ETFs to compile a list of 30 internet retail stocks and chose the top 11 with the highest analyst upside potential as of April 17, 2025. We also added the number of hedge fund holders for each stock as of Q4 2024. We sourced the hedge fund sentiment data from Insider Monkey’s database. The list is ordered in ascending order of analyst upside.
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 customer using the company’s e-commerce platform whilst shopping online.
PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD)
Analyst Upside: 65.67%
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 85
PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD) is a Chinese multinational online commerce group and retailer that owns and operates a range of diverse businesses. It also has a strong logistics, sourcing, and fulfillment capabilities network that supports its operations. The company owns Pinduoduo, a popular online commerce platform in China, and also runs the fast-growing e-commerce marketplace Temu. Temu now operates in more than 50 countries worldwide.
Analysts are bullish on PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD) and expect it to grow due to market share gains in China. Its continued expansion into international markets through the Temu platform is anticipated to accelerate and support this growth.
PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD) is focusing on a high-quality development strategy and has been actively optimizing its platform ecosystem to deliver impactful results over the long run. This strategy has helped the company report impressive financial results. The company delivered 24% year-over-year revenue growth in fiscal Q4 2024, reaching RMB 110.6 billion. Revenue for the full year 2024 reached RMB 393.8 billion, representing a 59% year-on-year increase.
PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD) also undertook various initiatives in H2 2024 to advance its high-quality development strategy and boost growth, including logistic support measures for e-commerce services in remote regions, a 10 billion fee reduction program, and a high-quality merchant support program. GreenWood Investors stated the following regarding PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:
“Aside from transitory foreign exchange translation losses (as opposed to trading losses), the two other notable detractors from our portfolio were MEI Pharma and PDD Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ:PDD) in 2024.
PDD Holdings founder Colin Huang is who inspired us to “run 3x faster,” as the relentless corporate culture of PDD has built an e-commerce company with roughly the same GMV (gross merchandise value) of Amazon in one-third the time it took Amazon to build itself. Shares reacted negatively when the company decided to reinvest its record margins into even faster growth and creating a healthier supplier ecosystem. As it looks set to create a second Amazon with its international site Temu, we are highly attracted to the opportunity. Sales are growing 4x faster than Amazon’s, yet shares are priced at less than a quarter of the Amazon earnings multiple.
PDD is a perfect example of why we want to look outside of the “Big Ten” companies that are nearly a third of global market indices. We would not want to compete with the demanding corporate culture of PDD and Temu. Its operating model is relentless at identifying efficiency throughout the manufacturing and selling supply chain. Not only is it a more formidable competitor than Amazon, and growing much faster, but the valuation is 4x more attractive than Amazon’s…” (Click here to read the full text)
Overall, PDD ranks 7th on our list of the best internet retail stocks to buy for 2025. While we acknowledge the potential for PDD as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. There is an AI stock that went up since the beginning of 2025, while popular AI stocks lost around 25%. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than PDD but trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.
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Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.