Yahoo Finance Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW): The ‘Best of Breed Bison’ AI Stock for the Rest of 2024
We recently published a list of 10 Best AI Stocks for the Second Half of 2024. Since Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW) ranks 6th on the list, it deserves a deeper look.
Wedbush Securities in a fresh note said mega-cap tech stocks have a 15% upside in the second half of 2024, driven by AI. Wedbush analyst Dan Ives, who has been beating the AI drum and thinks the AI “party” is just getting started, wrote that the $4 trillion AI arms race is between major tech players and GPU chips have become the new oil or gold in the tech industry.
Ives wrote that he thinks NASDAQ will have another strong second half of the year.
“Tech stocks will be up 15% the rest of 2024 in our view with tech fundamentals set to accelerate as AI use cases materially expand.”
While Ives continues to see the major tech stocks leading the AI market, he thinks the AI-led rally can broaden out to tech companies who have strong “installed” bases which can actually use generative AI applications and models.
Last month, while talking to CNBC, Ives said that the tech bull market is going to last for at least two more years. When asked what could be the threat to this bull run, Ives said that China could be a threat amid a possibility of “tech cold war” but he thinks that is a “contained threat.”
“It started off with the semis, but now it’s started to happen is, the demand and the use cases” are expanding to other companies. Ives called the AI boom the “fourth industrial revolution.”
We picked top AI stocks from Wedbush’s latest note. The firm named some of these stocks as the best picks for the second half of 2024 while called others “oversold” tech stocks. With each stock we have mentioned the number of hedge fund investors. 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 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
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Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW)
Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 78
Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW) is one of the best tech and AI stocks for the rest of 2024 according to Wedbush’s Dan Ives.
Strong demand in the cybersecurity industry is boosting Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW) across the Street. The stock is up 18% so far this year. Recently, Baird analysts Shrenik Kothari and Zachary Schneider said customers are focused in ROI and increased spending in the industry is benefitting Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW).
“PANW has seen this focus on ROI for some time now. Discounts are offered for larger deals rather than smaller ones to help lock in customers and maximize lifetime value. While still early days, initial customer response to new SASE 3.0 capabilities and AI features has been positive,” the analysts said.
They maintained an Outperform rating on the stock and upped their price target to $360 from $340.
Last month, DA Davidson also started covering the stock with a Buy rating and added it to its ‘Best of Breed Bison’ category of stocks.
DA Davidson’s Rudy Kessinger thinks Palo Alto Networks Inc’s (NASDAQ:PANW) three platforms will result in vendor consolidation which would be better than other companies. They believe Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW) has so far captured only 7% of the market that could reach a whopping $200 billion.
Palo Alto Networks Inc’s (NASDAQ:PANW) biggest strength is its Prisma Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) product, which generated about 50% growth in the fiscal third quarter year over year. Another growth catalyst for Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW) is Thunderdome Defense Information System Agency’s zero-trust network architecture.
ClearBridge Large Cap Growth Strategy stated the following regarding Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) in its first quarter 2024 investor letter:
“Given our view that the overall market looks expensive, mostly due to mega cap valuations, the low likelihood that technology can continue to deliver well above market returns and an expected slowdown in economic growth, risk management has guided our recent positioning activity. We have been consistently trimming from the select bucket and redeploying into undervalued stable and cyclical names, while also being cognizant of position sizing to maintain the latitude to add to names when prices become attractive.
During the first quarter, we continued to trim IT stocks into strength to manage risk while also adding to high-conviction positions. For example, we trimmed our active weight in Palo Alto Networks, Inc. (NASDAQ:PANW) after the information security software maker lowered its guidance in part due to a new emphasis on providing short-term discounts on product bundles to pursue its consolidation opportunity more aggressively. While this strategy should position the company more strongly in the future, it potentially increases volatility in operating results in the near-to-medium term.”
Overall, Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW) ranks 6th on Insider Monkey’s list titled 10 Best AI Stocks for the Second Half of 2024. While we acknowledge the potential of Palo Alto Networks Inc (NASDAQ:PANW), our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns, and doing so within a shorter timeframe. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than PANW 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.
