In this article, we discuss the Billionaire Howard Marks’ 10 Stock Picks with Huge Upside Potential.
Howard Marks, the billionaire chief of Oaktree Capital Management, recently appeared on news platform CNBC to outline a measured perspective on the current state of private credit, market valuations, and the dominance of tech giants. In the interview, Marks argued that the recent turmoil and gating, a term used to describe restricting withdrawals in private credit funds, was not an indictment of the asset class itself, but rather a sign of poor execution and investor misunderstanding. He compared investors who were shocked by a lack of daily liquidity to the shocked gambler in popular motion picture Casablanca. Marks underlined that the product was not broken but was simply sold to the wrong people who did not understand that private assets were not meant to be traded like stocks. Marks also discussed the challenges of valuations. He highlighted the inherent difficulty in valuing private assets because there was no public market to act as a reference point.
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He defined a fair mark as what an intelligent, unemotional buyer would pay for a stake today, but acknowledged that current marks were often by definition wrong because they could not account for the psychological shifts of a public market. When asked about the broader market, Marks remained cautious. He stated that this was not a market that was on sale, noting that optimists had been in control for 43 months. Despite the concentration in AI and the Magnificent Seven, Marks said he did not believe they were in a bubble. He pointed out that their P/E ratios were much more reasonable than the Nifty Fifty era of the late 1960s. He also argued that the top tech companies today were qualitatively superior to the market leaders of previous generations, justifying their current valuations.
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Our Methodology
For this article, we selected stocks by combing through the 13F portfolio of Oaktree Capital Management at the end of the fourth quarter of 2025. The top 50 stocks were ranked based on their analyst upside potential and the top 10 from this list were filtered out. Data for the hedge fund sentiment surrounding each stock was taken from Insider Monkey’s Q4 2025 database of 1041 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 498.7% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 303 percentage points (see more details here).
Howard Marks of Oaktree Capital Management
Billionaire Howard Marks’ Stock Picks with Huge Upside Potential
10. Nokia Oyj (NYSE:NOK)
Oaktree Capital Management’s Stake: $121 Million
Analyst Upside Potential: 19%
Oaktree Capital Management first disclosed a stake in Nokia Oyj (NYSE:NOK) in the first quarter of 2025. This position comprised over 18.7 million shares. Filings for the fourth quarter of 2025 show that the fund owns the same amount of shares as the first quarter of 2025. The company provides mobile, fixed, and cloud network solutions in North and Latin America, Greater China, India, Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The firm has transformed from a legacy telecom play into a high-conviction AI infrastructure stock, causing a significant spike in hedge fund accumulation.
Nokia Oyj (NYSE:NOK) added €1 billion in new AI-related orders in Q1 2026 alone, building on the €2.4 billion secured in 2025. AI and Cloud segments now represent 8% of total sales, double from 4% a year ago. Following this earnings beat, the stock surged toward a 16-year high, crossing the $10.40 mark. Analysts from Raymond James hiked their price target to $12, citing the next phase of growth in AI switching and routing. Elite investors are betting on Nokia’s first-mover advantage in the AI-RAN (Radio Access Network) era. In early 2026, the firm solidified a partnership with NVIDIA to build hybrid AI infrastructure. While 5G is maturing, Nokia is already securing early-stage 6G design wins in Europe and Asia-Pacific.
9. TORM plc (NASDAQ:TRMD)
Oaktree Capital Management’s Stake: $527 Million
Analyst Upside Potential: 38%
TORM plc (NASDAQ:TRMD) has been a staple in the 13F portfolio of Oaktree Capital Management since the third quarter of 2018. Back then, this position comprised 47.6 million shares. By the third quarter of 2019, the fund had grown this stake to over 48.2 million shares. Oaktree continued building on this position and had increased share ownership in the company to more than 53 million shares by the end of 2020. A period of stability followed, during which the fund did not make major changes to this stake. In late 2023 and early 2024, the fund started trimming the stake. Filings for the fourth quarter of 2025 show that the fund owned 26.4 million shares in the company, down close to 35% compared to filings for the previous quarter.
Investors who are looking for yield in a high-rate environment are piling into TORM plc (NASDAQ:TRMD) because it is one of the most aggressive dividend payers in the market. As of April, TORM’s dividend yield sits at a robust 8.99%. In Q1 2026, it paid out $0.70 per share, representing 82% of its net profit. Unlike crude oil tankers, the company specializes in refined products like gasoline, jet fuel, and diesel. Hedge funds are betting on a structural long for this specific sub-sector. Due to geopolitical shifts and refinery closures in Europe/Australia, refined products are being hauled over longer distances from the Middle East and India. This increased ton-mile demand allows TORM to charge higher rates for its fleet.
8. AngloGold Ashanti plc (NYSE:AU)
Oaktree Capital Management’s Stake: $328 Million
Analyst Upside Potential: 42%
AngloGold Ashanti plc (NYSE:AU) has featured in the 13F portfolio of Oaktree Capital Management since the third quarter of 2023. Back then, this position comprised over 5.4 million shares. The fund added to this stake by 8%, 2%, and 6% in the coming quarters, growing the holding to over 6.3 million shares. Thereafter, it started shedding the shares. Filings for the fourth quarter of 2025 show that the fund owned 3.8 million shares in the company, down more than 8% compared to filings for the third quarter of 2025. The firm operates as a gold mining company in Africa, Australia, and the Americas. It explores for gold, as well as by-products, including silver and sulphuric acid. The flagship property includes the 100% owned Geita mine located in the Lake Victoria goldfields of the Geita region in northwestern Tanzania.
Elite investors have been rewarding AngloGold Ashanti plc (NYSE:AU) for its rapid deleveraging. In its February 2026 and April 2026 financial updates, AngloGold revealed a massive balance sheet shift. The company moved from $567 million in net debt at the end of 2024 to a $879 million net cash position by early 2026. Total liquidity now sits at $4.4 billion, including $2.9 billion in cash and equivalents. Institutional accumulation surged following a record-breaking 2025 performance that set the stage for 2026 growth. AngloGold delivered a record $6.3 billion in adjusted EBITDA in 2025, a year-over-year increase of 129%.
7. Talen Energy Corporation (NASDAQ:TLN)
Oaktree Capital Management’s Stake: $124 Million
Analyst Upside Potential: 49%
Talen Energy Corporation (NASDAQ:TLN) first appeared in the 13F portfolio of Oaktree Capital Management in the third quarter of 2023. This position comprised just under 700,000 shares. The fund reduced this position by almost half in the next few months, shedding 43% of the stake to bring share ownership down to under 400,000 shares. Further reductions of 19% and 55% followed in the next two quarters. In the past two quarters, however, the fund has started loading up on the stock again. Filings for the fourth quarter of 2025 show that the fund owned over 331,000 shares in the company, up 14% compared to filings for the previous quarter.
Talen Energy Corporation (NASDAQ:TLN) has emerged as a high-conviction AI infrastructure play for hedge funds. While traditionally a utility stock, the smart money is now treating it as a backdoor way to invest in the data center power crunch. The primary catalyst for this is a unique partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS). In late 2025, Talen expanded its Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) with Amazon to supply up to 1,920 MW of carbon-free energy from its Susquehanna nuclear plant. This 17-year contract is estimated to generate roughly $18 billion in total revenue. In its Q4 2025 earnings call, the company reaffirmed its 2026 guidance for Adjusted Free Cash Flow of $980 million to $1.18 billion.
6. Garrett Motion Inc. (NASDAQ:GTX)
Oaktree Capital Management’s Stake: $298 Million
Analyst Upside Potential: 54%
Garrett Motion Inc. (NASDAQ:GTX) has been a constant feature in the 13F portfolio of Oaktree Capital Management since late 2020, barring a few exceptions. The fund first disclosed a stake in the company in the third quarter of 2020. This position comprised just over 3.5 million shares and was sold off by the next quarter. A new position was opened in the second quarter of 2021. This comprised close to 3.6 million shares. After sitting on this stake for many quarters, the fund loaded up on the stock in the second quarter of 2023, growing the holding to over 44 million shares. Filings for the fourth quarter of 2025 show that the fund owned just over 17 million shares in the company, down 46% compared to filings for the previous quarter.
Garrett Motion Inc. (NASDAQ:GTX) has been a legacy leader in turbochargers. However, the present interest in the stock is driven by its successful pivot into data center cooling and hybrid vehicle technology. Earlier this year, Garrett announced a strategic collaboration with Trane Technologies to integrate its high-speed centrifugal compressors into commercial HVAC systems. These oil-free compressors, originally developed for high-performance automotive engines, offer over 10% energy savings for data centers. In its Q4 2025 earnings report, the company reported a 6% revenue increase to $891 million, driven by gasoline share demand gains as consumers shift toward hybrids over pure EVs.
While we acknowledge the potential of GTX to grow, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and have limited downside risk. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than GTX and that has 100x upside potential, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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