In this article, we will take a look at the 15 Best Stocks to Buy According to Jim Simons’ Renaissance Technologies.
Even after his passing in 2024, billionaire investor and mathematician Jim Simons remains known as the “Quant King” of hedge funds due to the extraordinary success of Renaissance Technologies, his quantitative trading firm based in New York. After years of researching the finance industry, Simons realized the untapped potential of employing quantitative analysis to capitalize on market inefficiencies. This insight led him to develop a data-driven investment strategy of analyzing market behavior solely using statistical and mathematical models. By identifying subtle, non-random patterns in financial data, the quant genius predicted future stock movements and generated impressive returns.
Although it is closed to outside investors, Jim Simons’ secretive Medallion hedge fund, a flagship of Renaissance, has produced ground-breaking results since its inception. The Medallion Fund raked in impressive returns of 56.6% and 74.6% during the early 2000s dot-com crash and the global financial crisis between 2007 and 2011. The fund has maintained a substantial annual return of 31.5% since its first two years of operation. At the time of his death, Simons was worth $31.4 billion, ranking him among the world’s wealthiest individuals, thanks to the strong market performance of the Medallion Fund and Renaissance.
READ ALSO: Billionaire David Einhorn’s 10 Stock Picks with Huge Upside Potential and Billionaire Michael Platt’s 10 Stock Picks with Huge Upside Potential.
Renaissance Technologies’ computer-driven powerhouse came off to a great start after a stellar performance in 2024. The Renaissance Institutional Diversified Alpha Fund has gained 9.05% as of February, continuing to build on its impressive 2024 return of 15.6%, which was its best since its inception in 2021. Meanwhile, the Renaissance Institutional Equities Fund has had its best start in over ten years, rising 11.85% in the first two months of 2025. Both funds are allowed to maintain sizable individual stock positions in addition to using stock index futures and options to help manage risk. However, the firm warns that it may be difficult to quickly unwind these sizable holdings without impacting market prices.
Jim Simons of Renaissance Technologies
Our Methodology
For this list, we picked stocks from Renaissance Technologies’ 13F portfolio as of the end of the fourth quarter of 2024. These equities are also popular among elite hedge funds.
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 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).
15. Roblox Corporation (NYSE:RBLX)
Renaissance Technologies Q4 Stake: $438 million
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 61
Roblox Corporation (NYSE:RBLX) is a video game developer based in California. With 2.9 million developers, 6 million active experiences, and 88.9 million active users per day, Roblox Corporation (NYSE: RBLX) extends beyond the traditional definition of a video game by combining its digital currency and offering an extensive range of unique virtual experiences.
Aaron Lee, a Macquarie analyst, raised his price target for Roblox Corporation (NYSE:RBLX) shares from $76 to $80 on May 5, maintaining his rating at Outperform. The change follows Roblox’s impressive first-quarter results, which exceeded forecasts and prompted the company to raise its 2025 guidance. With a 31% increase in revenue and a 26% rise in daily active users (DAUs), Roblox recorded notable year-over-year growth, achieving over 98 million people. Additionally, the company reported a 4% rise in average bookings per DAU and a 30% increase in hours engaged, reaching 21.7 billion. As a result of these strong performances, Roblox has increased its 2025 revenue prediction from the previous estimate of $5,200 million to $5,300 million, now ranging from $5,285 million to $5,360 million.
SaltLight Capital stated the following regarding Roblox Corporation (NYSE:RBLX) in its Q3 2024 investor letter:
“Roblox Corporation (NYSE:RBLX) has firmly established itself as the dominant player in user-generated gaming within Western markets. Meanwhile, Tencent has developed a similar ecosystem in China with its WeChat Mini-games platform. Owning both gives us a unique vantage point to assess the evolving landscape of user-generated gaming platforms globally.
At its recent investor day, Roblox set an ambitious target of reaching 10% of gaming content revenue, of which it estimates the total pool is around $180bn (for context, in the last twelve months, it made $4bn in bookings).
We think this will be a challenging target, but it will be positive for the business directionally. The reason is that Roblox has spent the last three years heavily investing in re-engineering its game platform to be high fidelity, performant and widely available across platforms. They also share economics with their creators to the point now that the absolute numbers in highly engaged games are enough to support a small game studio. The result is that the quality of games has materially improved, attracting additional engagement – particularly from older users…” (Click here to read the full text)
14. Robinhood Markets, Inc. (NASDAQ:HOOD)
Renaissance Technologies Q4 Stake: $450 million
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 79
Robinhood Markets, Inc. (NASDAQ:HOOD) is a California-based financial services company that utilizes a mobile app to offer commission-free trading of stocks, exchange-traded funds, and cryptocurrencies, as well as individual retirement plan administration.
Robinhood Markets, Inc. (NASDAQ:HOOD) reported outstanding first-quarter 2025 earnings, with revenue up 50% year-over-year and record net deposits of $18 billion. The company also experienced double-digit increases in trading volumes across every segment, including an 84% surge in stocks and record options volume. Moreover, the number of the company’s gold subscribers nearly doubled year-over-year to 3.2 million at the end of the quarter.
On May 1, MP Securities analyst Devin Ryan reiterated his Market Outperform rating and $70 price target for Robinhood Markets, Inc. (NASDAQ:HOOD), citing the company’s strong growth trajectory. Ryan stated that Robinhood’s revenue of $927 million slightly exceeded expectations by around 2%. Although expenses were somewhat higher than predicted, the increase was due to one-time transaction fees associated with the TradePMR agreement. The analyst also noted that Robinhood repurchased $322 million of its shares during the quarter and increased its share repurchase authorization by $500 million, bringing the total buyback program to $1.5 billion.
