In this article, we will discuss Here is How Billionaire Philippe Laffont’s Top 5 Picks Crushed The Market. Please visit Here is How Billionaire Philippe Laffont’s Top 10 Picks Crushed The Market, if you would like to see the extended list and the methodology behind it.
Philippe Laffont of Coatue Management
5. GE Vernova Inc. (NYSE:GEV)
YTD Stock Performance: +76%
Philippe Laffont’s Stake: $2.20 Billion
The growing demand for electricity amid the AI and data center boom sits at the center of the bull case for GE Vernova Inc. (NYSE:GEV). Why? Because the company is directly exposed to the infrastructure needed to power this surge in energy use, especially through gas turbines and grid equipment.
The biggest growth engine for the stock is gas turbines and the electrification of the grid. These turbines are used to generate large-scale electricity, while grid equipment ensures that power is transmitted efficiently to end users like cities and data centers. This is especially important because AI infrastructure requires stable, high-intensity power 24/7.
Data centers alone generated about $2.4 billion in orders in a recent quarter, which was more than the total orders from the entire previous year, showing how fast demand has accelerated from AI buildouts.
GE Vernova Inc’s (NYSE:GEV) moat is strong because it is one of the few global companies that can provide large-scale gas turbines + full grid infrastructure + long-term servicing contracts. These are highly complex, capital-intensive products that take years to manufacture and qualify, which limits competition and creates long-term customer lock-in.
Mar Vista U.S. Quality Strategy stated the following regarding GE Vernova Inc. (NYSE:GEV) in its Q1 2026 investor letter:
“GE Vernova Inc. (NYSE:GEV) is a global leader in the electric power industry, providing products and services across the electricity value chain. Following its April 2024 spin-off from General Electric (GE), GE Vernova operates as an independent company focused on power, wind and electrification. GEV’s installed base helps generate approximately 25% of the world’s electricity. The company maintains one of the largest installed fleets of heavy-duty gas turbines globally. GEV’s combination of equipment sales and high-margin service revenue creates a robust backlog and long-term earnings visibility. We believe GEV possesses a durable competitive moat driven by its scale, technological leadership and deep relationships with governments, utilities and industrial customers.
Artificial intelligence and data center growth are key demand drivers. The projected energy required to enable this growth is significant, with the International Energy Agency expecting global data center electricity consumption to double by 2030 and triple by 2035 compared to 2024. This dynamic is driving significant investment in reliable power generation and grid modernization, areas where GEV is well positioned to benefit…” (Click here to read the full text)
4. Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN)
YTD Stock Performance: +14%
Philippe Laffont’s Stake: $2.29 Billion
Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) has quickly evolved from just an e-commerce and cloud company into a broader AI infrastructure giant, with growth coming from cloud services (AWS), advertising, and now its own AI chips business. A key part of this is Amazon.com’s (NASDAQ:AMZN) custom chips like Trainium and Graviton, along with networking hardware such as Nitro. These chips are used to train and run AI models more efficiently, helping both Amazon and its customers reduce reliance on external chipmakers like Nvidia.
The scale of this business is already significant, with an annual revenue run rate of over $20 billion and growing at triple-digit rates year over year. Demand is coming from major customers hungry for AI chips. Meta recently announced a deal with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to bring tens of millions of AWS Graviton cores into Meta’s compute portfolio. OpenAI has committed to spending around $100 billion on AWS over time in exchange for large-scale infrastructure access, and Anthropic has also expanded its relationship with Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) with multibillion-dollar investments.
Cloud remains the biggest long-term catalyst for Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN). It has a roughly 30–32% share of the global cloud infrastructure market, ahead of Microsoft and Google. AWS moat remains strong because the reliability and scalability it provides to large corporations. Switching costs in the cloud market are high as migrating enterprise systems can cost millions and take years, helping maintain stable recurring revenue.
AWS ecosystem of services is another strong business moat. Unlike Microsoft Azure and Google Cloud, AWS offers 240+ cloud services, allowing companies to build, train and deploy AI models, store data, run applications and manage cybersecurity within one platform, increasing switching costs and strengthening customer lock-in over time.
Vulcan Value Partners stated the following regarding Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) in its Q1 2026 investor letter:
“There were seven material detractors to performance: Ares Management Corporation, Ryan Specialty Holdings, Inc., Microsoft Corporation, Salesforce, Inc., UnitedHealth Group Incorporated, Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), and SAP SE. Amazon reported strong results for its fiscal year and fourth quarter. During the fourth quarter, AWS’s revenue increased 24% and highly profitable advertising revenue grew 22%. AWS is benefitting from AI driven demand for its cloud services and its growth is accelerating. In addition, Amazon is aggressively building out its promising Leo satellite service that will compete with Starlink. As a result, Amazon’s capital spending is forecast to increase over 50% in 2026 to approximately $200 billion. We expect a solid return on this capital spending. Bears believe that Amazon is investing too much money in capital spending. Our view is that it is a darn good problem to have and that Amazon will become even more competitively entrenched as the leading cloud services provider in the world.”
3. Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META)
YTD Stock Performance: +3%
Philippe Laffont’s Stake: $2.49 Billion
Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META) is becoming an advertising powerhouse and is now on track to surpass Alphabet in digital ad revenue, driven by strong AI-led execution. Meta gets about 97% of its revenue from advertising. It’s seeing growth in key metrics like price per ad and total ad impressions. Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ:META) has a strong edge in the ads market in the age of AI. How? Meta ads are shown inside apps like Instagram and Facebook and its tools like Advantage+ analyze massive user data and automatically find the best audiences, improving return on ad spend. On the other hand, Google’s traditional “pull” ads (search-based) are facing pressure as behavior shifts toward AI-driven discovery.
Meta Platforms Inc’s (NASDAQ:META) net digital advertising revenue is expected to reach approximately $240+ billion by 2026, slightly ahead of Alphabet’s Google in the same category, according to eMarketer estimates.
The Meta Training and Inference Accelerator (MTIA) is expected to lower Meta’s reliance on Nvidia chips. META has a forward P/E of 22x, down from its historical average of 25.5x and lower than major Magnificent Seven peers and the broader industry average for high-growth tech.
Montaka Global Investments stated the following regarding Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) in its Q1 2026 investor letter:
“The strength of an investment opportunity depends on the price at which you can acquire current and future earnings power. We see many instances today of strong competitive advantages being offered by the market at highly-attractive prices. Based on Montaka’s internal assessments, here are several:
Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) — Towards the end of March, Meta’s stock price hit US$526 per share, a level that implies an enterprise value (EV) multiple of less than 13x 2026 earnings before interest and tax (EBIT7). We assess this valuation multiple is far too low for a business growing revenues faster than 20% per annum and with competitive advantages as strong as Meta’s.”
2. Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)
YTD Stock Performance: -12%
Philippe Laffont’s Stake: $2.50 Billion
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) shares recently came into the spotlight after the company amended its deal with OpenAI. The deal reportedly caps how much OpenAI must pay Microsoft and would also end Microsoft’s exclusive right to sell OpenAI’s AI models. Evercore, which has an Outperform rating and a $580 price target on Microsoft, said this change would provide more flexibility for Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT).
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) shares are up 8% over the past 12 months but down 12% so far this year. AI-disruption fears are impacting the stock. The concerns are simple: if everyone uses AI for daily office tasks like writing, making spreadsheets, presentations and analysis, how could Microsoft Corporation’s (NASDAQ:MSFT) software suite and offerings survive in the future?
Microsoft 365 (Word, Excel, Teams subscriptions) growth is slowing. Copilot has only 15 million users (~3% penetration), while rivals like Gemini Enterprise are gaining faster. Competitors like Alphabet and Amazon are investing more aggressively, while Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) still relies heavily on Nvidia for chips.
But Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) bulls believe the company is not just another SaaS player. It can easily shift from a per-seat pricing model to a per-workload model. It has the largest enterprise distribution networks in the world, with over 450 million commercial users across an ecosystem. There are about 3.7 million businesses and more than 80% of Fortune 500 companies use Microsoft software.
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) can monetize higher usage through Copilot, automation, and cloud compute even if its basic software offerings decline.
Vulcan Value Partners stated the following regarding Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) in its Q1 2026 investor letter:
“Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)is the world’s largest software company with a broad range of offerings including Microsoft office, gaming, Azure cloud computing, LinkedIn, and more. Microsoft also has a large investment in OpenAI which allows them to have full access to all of OpenAI’s intellectual property. We think Microsoft is one of the most competitively entrenched businesses in the world and will be a beneficiary from AI.
Microsoft delivered another strong quarter, with revenues up +15% and operating profits up +19% on a constant currency basis. Our value grew nicely. Microsoft’s cloud business, Azure, grew at a robust +38% constant currency rate. Microsoft continues to invest heavily in capital spending as it continues to build cloud capacity to meet customer demand, which continues to outstrip supply. Despite this heavy capital spending, which has attractive returns, free cash flow remains very robust.
We believe the company is trading at a remarkably attractive valuation. We believe we are paying roughly fair value for its intelligent cloud business, including Azure, and getting the software business for free. Alternatively, we are paying roughly fair value for the software business and getting its intelligent cloud business for free. We think we own Microsoft with a substantial margin of safety.”
1. Taiwan Semiconductor (NYSE:TSM)
YTD Stock Performance: +33%
Philippe Laffont’s Stake: $2.62 Billion
Taiwan Semiconductor (NYSE:TSM) shares recently jumped after regulators in Taiwan eased limitations that would reportedly allow fund managers to increase their exposure to the stock. But beyond this news, what let’s see the fundamental growth drivers of the stock.
Taiwan Semiconductor (NYSE:TSM) is among the top beneficiaries of the rising AI CapEx that is likely to touch $700 billion. Why? TSM has about 62% of the total foundry market and over 90% of the market for advanced nodes (7nm and below). Taiwan Semiconductor’s (NYSE:TSM) customers don’t switch because finding other chip foundries is extremely hard, if not impossible.
Apple relies on Taiwan Semiconductor (NYSE:TSM) for chips, including for A-series and M-series. Taiwan Semiconductor makes AI GPUs for Nvidia used in data centers. AMD, Qualcomm, Broadcom, MediaTek and Marvell also rely on it for production.
Read what a Broadcom executive recently said about the demand Taiwan Semiconductor (NYSE:TSM) is facing here.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (NYSE:TSM) has raised its capital expenditure forecast to $56 billion for 2026 and plans $165 billion in US investments over the next few years. Its moat and high-capacity production make it an attractive buy for the long term despite its gains.
Montaka Global Investments stated the following regarding Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (NYSE:TSM) in its Q1 2026 investor letter:
“We also acquired Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (NYSE:TSM) – more commonly known as TSMC – the world’s effective monopolist in AI semiconductor fabrication.
Given Montaka’s deep work in AI over many years, we’ve been following this company for some time. We had previously opted against investing in TSMC because of over geopolitical tail risk concerns, and we continue to handicap this investment for its concentrated exposure to Taiwan.
That said, the combination of accelerating demand for AI compute, combined with limited opportunities to expand US electric power generation capacity, means enhanced power efficiency will likely be a primary source of compute capacity expansion for the world’s cloud computing hyperscalers. And this gives TSMC extreme pricing power that we believe continues to be underestimated.”
While we acknowledge the potential of TSM 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 TSM and that has 100x upside potential, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.
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