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4 Solid Stocks to Watch on a Booming Metaverse Space

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The COVID-19 pandemic has brought about a major social change and made life dependent on the digital world. The pandemic taught people to work, learn and shop remotely, order food and other necessities online, go for contactless payments and restrict themselves to indoor entertainment like playing video games.

The virtual world, or metaverse, which is reachable to millions globally for business, communication, learning, entertainment, and more, is thus gradually taking control of our present and future.

A Metaverse Future With Huge Growth Potential

The metaverse is the most recent development in the digitization field. In a nutshell, a metaverse is a collaborative and participatory virtual universe. Metaverse includes virtual reality, which is characterized by persistent virtual environments that exist even when one is not playing, and augmented reality, which fuses elements of the digital and real worlds.

Experts believe that the metaverse universe has just begun its journey and holds immense potential for the future.

According to a recent report by the management consulting company McKinsey, consumer and business use cases for the metaverse are projected to generate $4-$5 trillion by 2030. Another report from market research firm BlueWeave Consulting shows that the global metaverse market was worth $40.7 billion in 2021 and will witness a CAGR of 40.5%, generating revenues of more than $439 billion by 2028.

The metaverse world was taking baby steps till some time back but the pandemic gave it a sudden push as an increasing number of people became dependent on technology. Demand for working and learning from home, or shopping and paying bills online, which picked up during the peak of the pandemic, is now the new normal.

At the same time, this space has increased the adoption of non-fungible tokens and cryptocurrencies. Astute investors, thus, should keep a watch on businesses that are positioned to gain from the expanding metaverse market.

Stocks to Watch

We have narrowed our search to four stocks whose growth will be propelled by the metaverse expansion. These are Apple, Inc. (AAPL - Free Report) , Snap Inc. (SNAP - Free Report) , Autodesk, Inc. (ADSK - Free Report) and NVIDIA Corporation (NVDA - Free Report) . These companies currently carry a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.

Apple, Inc. encourages app developers to include machine learning and artificial intelligence in their apps. A long-term growth opportunity is presented by AAPL's concentration on driverless vehicles and augmented reality/virtual reality technologies. Over the years, Apple has bought a number of smaller businesses with expertise in AR hardware, 3D gaming, and VR software namely SensoMotoric, Flyby Media, Emotient, TupleJump, Turi, Metaio, PrimeSense, and Lattice Data Inc. in order to step up its efforts.

Apple’s expected earnings growth for the current year is 3.4%. AAPL reported fourth-quarter fiscal 2022 earnings of $1.29 per share, beating the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.26 per share.  Apple has reported an earnings beat in each of the last four reported quarters.

Snap Inc. is focusing on creating AR hardware through its Spectacle smart glasses. The company's AR lenses have gained significant popularity, especially since the release of Lens Studio 2. In collaboration with Verizon, Snap unveiled its first Landmarker Lens (a brand-new tool for superimposing augmented reality on the real world) around the end of 2020. The Lens takes advantage of Verizon's 5G Ultra-Wideband capabilities with SNAP's augmented reality technology.

The widespread use of items like Scan and AR Bar is propelling the use of AR-based lenses and offering SNAP considerable growth opportunities. Additionally, it is anticipated that the introduction of Local Lenses, which permits shared and permanent AR experiences across far broader geographic regions, will increase user engagement.

Snap’s expected earnings growth for next year is more than 100%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for current-year earnings has improved more than 100% over the past 60 days.

Autodesk, Inc. is expected to make long-term gains from its business transition from perpetual licensing to cloud-based subscription services. Top-line growth is expected to be fueled by increased demand for Autodesk's cloud-based (BIM 360 cloud platform, Shotgun, and Fusion Lifecycle), mobile (AutoCAD 360), and design suite solutions. Aside from its e-store, ADSK also gains from its investment in digital infrastructure.

Autodesk’s expected earnings growth for the current year is 30.2%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for current-year earnings has improved 1% over the past 60 days.

NVIDIA's robust portfolio of cutting-edge graphics cards has made it a popular graphics card supplier and is anticipated to aid the business's entry into the metaverse gaming market. In this respect, NVDA's Omniverse is also noteworthy. Omniverse is a shared platform where live interactions between users and applications happen with real-time speed and virtual reality thanks to its RTX technology.

NVIDIA’s expected earnings growth for next year is 30.1%. Shares of NVDA have gained 14% in the past 30 days.


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