Every investor wants to become (at least) a millionaire.
To help get you there, it's a good idea to invest in growth stocks, especially those with a long track record of success and a set of competitive advantages. It also helps if the stock has an attractive valuation, as that will make it easy for the stock to grow through multiple expansion.
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While your quest to reach millionaire status will be influenced by your time horizon and your risk tolerance, two stocks that can help you get there are MercadoLibre (NASDAQ: MELI) and Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU).
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1. MercadoLibre: The Latin American e-commerce leader
Much like Amazon in the U.S., MercadoLibre has put together an impressive set of interconnected businesses, giving it a competitive advantage in Latin America.
The company's primary business is as a direct e-commerce seller and third-party e-commerce marketplace. It also owns a large fintech business, Mercado Pago, that includes payments on its own e-commerce platform, point-of-sales systems for brick-and-mortar retailers, credit cards, and a lending platform. MercadoLibre performs deliveries of its e-commerce orders through Mercado Envios, and it even has an asset management arm known as Mercado Fondo.
MercadoLibre is capitalizing on the large opportunity for e-commerce and digital payments in Latin America and continues to grow quickly. In the fourth quarter, revenue rose 37%, or 96% on a currency-neutral basis. That was driven by 33% growth in total payment volume to $59 million, and 8% growth in gross merchandise volume (GMV), or the total value of goods sold on its platform.
Its strengthening ecosystem has also driven competitive advantages and led to margin expansion on the bottom line. In the fourth quarter, its operating income reached a record of $820 million, more than doubling from the quarter a year ago.
MercadoLibre still has a lot of room for growth in its core markets of Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina, and there's a huge market in Latin America beyond those countries. It's found a winning formula, and it's likely to continue to deliver results for investors. Considering its growth rate, the stock also trades at a reasonable valuation.
2. Micron Technology: Capitalizing on a memory chip rebound
Micron is an integrated device manufacturer (IDM) focused on memory chips. That means the company both designs its chips and manufactures them, giving it more risk than a company that only designs chips. Historically, Micron has been highly cyclical as the price of memory chips can change quickly, but in the artificial intelligence (AI) era, the company is entering a boom cycle, and investors could reap the rewards.
Micron is a close partner of Nvidia, and, in fact, Nvidia is now its biggest customer, driving 13% of its revenue as Nvidia counts on its high-bandwidth memory chips for its Blackwell platform, which should help give the company a tailwind in the AI buildout.
Revenue nearly doubled in its most recent quarter to $8.7 billion, and profitability surged as well, as the company reported an operating margin of 25%. There's also clear evidence that Micron is benefiting from the AI boom. Data center revenue jumped 400% year over year and 40% sequentially in the fiscal first quarter. The data center and networking segment now makes up 55% of its revenue, meaning it should be an even greater driver of overall revenue growth.
Demand for memory chips will almost certainly grow as they're needed for AI applications, and that should drive the company's growth over the next several years. Meanwhile, the stock looks like a bargain compared to most of its semiconductor peers, trading at a forward price-to-earnings ratio of less than 14, and earnings are expected to soar again next year.
While price and supply dynamics will continue to be fluid, Micron stock is in a great position to soar over the next year, given its valuation and the tailwinds in AI.
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John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Jeremy Bowman has positions in Amazon, MercadoLibre, Micron Technology, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, MercadoLibre, and Nvidia. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.
