We recently published a list of 13 Best NASDAQ Stocks to Buy So Far in 2025. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) stands against other NASDAQ stocks to buy in 2025.

On April 4, Wedbush analyst Dan Ives appeared on CNBC to discuss the potential impact of current tariffs and compared the situation to an economic armageddon. If the current tariffs remain in place, Ives thinks it would lead to a 15% to 20% demand reduction across the board. He thinks that investor anxiety is much higher considering how things were in the March 2020 COVID-19 crash earlier. The analyst thinks that investors should now focus on the likelihood of tariff adjustments from comments about negotiations, the impact on consumer-focused companies, and the potential for demand destruction. He even thinks that companies may refuse to provide guidance in the first-quarter earnings calls due to the persistent tariff uncertainty.

Ives thinks that a lot of tech companies will not be able to absorb high tariff increases and rather this cost will be passed on to the consumers which will lead to significant margin erosion and even potential sales declines. He indicated that tech stocks are currently pricing in a 10% to 15% cut to numbers. He suggests that investors should now look at companies with strong long-term potential as he believes earnings may normalize in 2025 and 2026. The analyst also addressed the defensive performance of defense contractors. While acknowledging the relative stability here, Ives cautioned that even these even such sectors are not immune to tariffs. He noted the significant foreign component, specifically 40% to 50% in some instances, in hardware and other sectors.

Our Methodology

We sifted through the financial media reports to compile a list of the top NASDAQ stocks to buy for 2025. We then selected the 13 stocks that were the most popular among elite hedge funds and that analysts were bullish on. The stocks are ranked in ascending order of the number of hedge funds that have stakes in them, as of Q4 2024. The hedge fund data was sourced from Insider Monkey’s database which tracks the moves of over 900 elite money managers.

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).

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)

Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 166

Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) designs and manufactures smart devices. It offers smartphones under the iPhone line, personal computers under the Mac line, and multi-purpose tablets, under the iPad line. It also offers other accessories and wearables, like the AirPods, Apple TV, Apple Watch, Beats products, and HomePod. It also offers AppleCare support and cloud services.

Erik Woodring from Morgan Stanley lowered his iPhone shipment estimates for 2025-2026 by 1% to 5% because of delayed releases at the company. This is because of quality issues and malfunction rates that exceed 80%. Since June 2024, many features planned for release in April with iOS 18.4 2025 have been postponed. The company now aims to fix these issues by 2026, but the investors are already concerned about the competitiveness of its AI development.

Woodring has also reduced his price target on Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) from $275 to $252 due to the lack of an AI-driven iPhone upgrade cycle. The company is generally best known for its iPhone product cycle, with 52% of its revenue coming from this product line. The company has over 2.2 billion devices on sale and the next target is now to integrate AI for strengthening these service offerings.

Columbia Seligman Global Technology Fund is optimistic about the company due to iPhone 17’s AI potential. It stated the following regarding Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) in its Q4 2024 investor letter:

“The fund maintained a position in Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) throughout the quarter through the release of the company’s new iPhone 16 in September. Company leaders were excited about the release of the new model, as this is the first model that will feature enhanced AI capabilities through the Apple Intelligence features. Sales for the first few weeks in October and November trailed behind year over year sales from the iPhone 15, as availability of Apple Intelligence was not compatible with all iPhone models. Apple announced a partnership with OpenAI that has allowed the integration of ChatGPT into the Apple ecosystem, separate from the core Apple Intelligence features. This partnership highlights continued progress from Apple to introduce AI capabilities into its products and we expect the iPhone 17 to have even more expansive AI capabilities, increasing potential demand for the new model that is on track to be released in 2025.”

Overall, AAPL ranks 6th on our list of the best NASDAQ stocks to buy so far in 2025. While we acknowledge the growth potential of AAPL, our conviction lies in the belief that AI stocks hold great promise for delivering high returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. There is an AI stock that went up since the beginning of 2025, while popular AI stocks lost around 25%. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than AAPL but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about the cheapest AI stock.

READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and 30 Best Stocks to Buy Now According to Billionaires.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.