12 AI Stocks Making Waves on Wall Street

5. Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 159

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) is one of the 12 AI Stocks Making Waves on Wall Street. On July 9, Wedbush has reiterated its “Outperform” rating on the stock and maintained its price target at $270.00. The rating affirmation reflects continued confidence in Apple’s potential.

According to the firm, Apple should make the move to acquire Perplexity AI Inc. so that it can strengthen its artificial intelligence offerings. Analyst Dan Ives noted the potential acquisition to be a “no-brainer.”

Ives noted how major tech giants such as Nvidia, Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, OpenAI, and Oracle are engaged in an “arms race” to monetize AI. Ives said this race is notably “the biggest tech trend in the last 50 years.”

Even though Apple boasts “the biggest and most entrenched consumer installed base in the world with 2.4 billion iOS devices and 1.5 billion iPhones,” the tech giant is still falling behind in this race.

Apple’s internal efforts for developing Apple Intelligence have been nothing less than disappointing. There were no major announcements made at the Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) either, which massively disappointed investors and most importantly developers.”

“The time has come Apple needs to acquire Perplexity to significantly boost its AI platform.”

According to Ives, the acquisition could help “redefine Apple’s AI strategy and would fit in very well with Siri.”

Even though Apple may need to pay up around $30 billion for the acquisition, Ives believes this is only “a drop in the bucket relative to the monetization opportunity.”

Apple is a technology company known for its consumer electronics, particularly the iPhones and MacBooks.