You don’t need to buy 10-20 stocks in a year to diversify your portfolio. Buying two different stocks at an opportunistic time can generate significant returns. It is like buying quality over quantity. This year presents a good opportunity for tech stocks.
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Two stocks I would pick in 2025, and here’s why
After Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential election, there was a wave of optimism in the crypto world. Trump favours crypto, and Elon Musk’s involvement in the policy decisions could make America a pro-crypto economy. There is also the expectation of Bitcoin becoming a national reserve asset.
Hive stock
Amid the upcoming optimism, Canada’s Bitcoin mining company Hive Digital Technologies (TSXV:HIVE) has shifted its headquarters to Texas. Hive is spending a significant amount on building mining and high-performance computing (HPC) capacity. The company is opening a new data center in Paraguay, adding to its three data centres in Canada, Sweden, and Iceland.
The company’s fundamentals are not good for the short term as the significant investment in graphics processing units (GPUs) has accelerated its depreciation. Moreover, the operating expense is high as Bitcoin mining becomes expensive. This has led to a few quarters of net loss.
Hive has more than $1.1 billion in long-term loans. But it also has a Bitcoin inventory of $1.65 billion, which keeps its net cash positive. I am bullish on the stock as rising Bitcoin prices could increase Hive’s profit margins. Moreover, Hive’s HPC revenue is growing by leaps and bounds from $253,000 in the quarter ended September 2023 to $1.8 million in the quarter ended September 2024.
Hive’s move to the U.S. will see the company report its future earnings in U.S. dollars. A surge in artificial intelligence (AI) adoption could help Hive stabilize its earnings.
The stock is currently trading below $4.5, 1.44 times the book value per share. Book value is important for a stock like Hive because its value lies in its Bitcoin holdings. If Bitcoin price crosses the $100,000 mark, Hive’s book value will also increase, driving the stock upwards by 50-80%.
AMD
Another tech stock with a good growth opportunity is Advanced Micro Devices (NASDAQ: AMD). The company was late to enter the AI space. However, it is moving strategically in AI, targeting AI stack from PCs and edge devices to the data center. While Nvidia is a frontrunner and remains an unbeatable contender, AMD has ample room to grab AI data centre market share.
However, short-term headwinds of weak demand in embedded and PC chips have pulled AMD stock down 28.7% since October. If you look at AMD’s stock price momentum since its 2016 turnaround, every dip was a buying opportunity as the stock revived and grew significantly. Driving this growth were the product launches that competed with Intel and provided an alternative to Nvidia GPUs.
AMD has made its place in the chip market as a cost-efficient option for your computing needs. Its vast product suite of network computing, PC, and data centre computing, puts it at an advantage to enjoy more growth cycles.
A strategy I would follow is to keep accumulating AMD shares at every cyclical dip and holding them for the next 10 years. As long as the company’s product roadmap and demand for its chips remain strong, it could triple or quadruple your money in five to seven years.
As for 2025, AMD stock could see a short-term downturn if Trump rekindles the 2018 China trade war this year.
