Billionaires Ray Dalio and Philippe Laffont are two of the brightest minds in investing, and both have strong views on AI. Laffont runs Coatue Management and has built his hedge fund around the technology. Dalio founded Bridgewater Associates in 1975 and warns that AI has become a crowded trade. Let’s start with Laffont.
Laffont: AI Is a Supercycle, and the Next $10 Trillion Company Could Come From It
Laffont sees a supercycle in AI, and Coatue’s four biggest US long positions as of March 31 were all AI-related, Bloomberg reported. Coatue’s flagship hedge fund lost 8.3% in July, its worst month in more than a year, but was still up 14.3% for the year (at the time of the Bloomberg report), after a gain in May that was its best month in 25 years, Bloomberg said in August. Check his top stock picks here.
Laffont expects a $10 trillion company within 10 to 15 years, he told CNBC in June. He thinks the winner could be a new AI name. There is “a good chance that OpenAI and Anthropic could be there,” he said, and SpaceX could join them.
Agentic AI excites him most. Laffont described going to bed while a thousand AI agents do the work, and he says the productivity gains already show up in his own office. He does not expect AI models to become free, because people will pay for the best ones.
Dalio: AI Is a Great Tool and a Crowded Trade
Dalio built Bridgewater out of a two-bedroom apartment, and its flagship Pure Alpha fund rose 33% in 2025, Reuters reported. Click to read more about Dalio’s portfolio.
A US debt crisis could hit within three years, he told Bloomberg Television in October. The government spends about 40% more than it takes in, he says, and debt payments squeeze out other spending. Stocks look expensive by most of his measures, and the extra return they offer over bonds has shrunk. AI adds to the risk, because a small group of AI stocks drives the market, and the big AI spenders now rely more on debt to fund their buildout. His one warning to investors is to avoid being “too concentrated in one particular asset,” such as AI.
Dalio still likes AI as a tool. Using it to systematize investment decisions is the future, he says, and he expects gains to broaden from the AI builders to the companies that use the technology. See what else Bridgewater bought here.
Both billionaires own AI stocks. Here are the 10 biggest AI holdings the two funds have in common. You can watch a video version of this article by clicking the image below:
Methodology
We looked at the top 50 holdings in the second quarter 2026 13F filings of Ray Dalio’s Bridgewater Associates and Philippe Laffont’s Coatue Management. From the AI stocks that appear in both lists, we picked the 10 with the highest combined dollar value across the two stakes and ranked them in ascending order. Stake sizes and share changes come from the funds’ 13F filings for the quarter ended June 30.
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. Insider Monkey’s quarterly newsletter strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 599.2% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 372 percentage points (see more details here).
#10 ASML Holding N.V. (NASDAQ:ASML)
Coatue Stake $587.7 Million | Bridgewater Stake $122.7 Million
Philippe Laffont’s Coatue Management held $587.7 million of the stock at the end of the second quarter, or 1.21% of its portfolio, after trimming 200,828 shares. Ray Dalio’s Bridgewater Associates held $122.7 million, or 0.50% of its portfolio, after trimming 30,521 shares. ASML’s EUV systems are already fully booked, which is why we asked whether it is the AI stock with the widest moat. Read the full analysis here.
ASML Holding is one of the few AI players with a strong moat. Why? It makes extreme ultraviolet lithography machines, which print the tiny circuits on advanced chips, and it is the only commercial supplier of them. Each machine has about 100,000 parts and runs in a vacuum. A rival would have to copy ASML’s technology and its network of specialist suppliers, such as ZEISS, and chipmakers have built their factories around ASML equipment, so switching would be costly. ASML benefits no matter which chip designer wins the AI race.
ASML trades at about 34 times forward earnings, so the stock already pays for a lot of AI growth. A near-monopoly can still deliver weak returns when investors have priced in years of strong results. Chip equipment is cyclical, and if chipmakers delay new factories, orders can drop quickly. Tighter export limits on China could cut sales. Slower adoption of its newest High-NA machines, or limits on how many machines it can build, would also hold back growth at ASML.
#9 Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)
Coatue Stake $1.1 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $265.6 Million
Coatue added 456,392 shares of Microsoft in the second quarter and held $1.1 billion at the end of it, or 2.25% of its portfolio. Bridgewater trimmed 373,083 shares and held $265.6 million, or 1.09% of its portfolio. Investors are nervous about whether the stock can keep growing as Microsoft spends heavily on AI. Check whether that spending is paying off here.
Some believe Microsoft has an advantage over its rivals amid ongoing worries about an AI spending slowdown. Its strong balance sheet and steady cash flow set it apart from other big AI spenders, Truist Securities said in a note on Monday. Microsoft’s credit default swap spreads, a gauge of how risky lenders see a company, remain the tightest among the major AI players. It is also the only one of six big AI names expected to generate positive free cash flow in 2027, even if only slightly, the firm said. Truist expects Azure growth to stay in at least the mid-40% range into the next quarter, helped by demand that still outstrips supply across the industry. It kept its Buy rating and raised its price target to $600 from $575, assuming long-term revenue growth of 14.5% a year, up from 12%.
#8 NVIDIA Corporation (NASDAQ:NVDA)
Coatue Stake $1.21 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $773.6 Million
Coatue trimmed 276,423 shares of NVIDIA and held $1.21 billion, or 2.49% of its portfolio. Bridgewater trimmed 826,808 shares and still held $773.6 million, or 3.17% of its portfolio. NVIDIA is Bridgewater’s largest individual stock position. The stock has slipped after a rough two weeks for AI stocks, and two billionaires still like it. See who they are here.
While Nvidia is everywhere in the AI trade, some believe it would be the first to get hit if the AI bubble bursts. Competition is also a key factor in the bear case. Its biggest customers are building their own chips. Microsoft unveiled its Maia 300 chip this month, which it says delivers 40% more AI tokens per megawatt than leading GPU-based systems, and plans to use it as the main inference system for its own products. Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and OpenAI have chip programs too, and bears say each workload moved in-house gives the buyer more leverage on Nvidia’s prices.
In China, Nvidia’s AI chip shipments fell 44% in the first half, cutting its market share to 34%, with Huawei at 28%, IDC data showed. How much of the AI chip market Nvidia really controls is a growing question. Check what the data shows here. Bears also worry about the startups Nvidia has funded. More than 80% of neocloud providers may not survive as independent businesses beyond 2030, Gartner predicted, and Nvidia has put tens of billions into customers such as CoreWeave, Nebius and OpenAI. The AI debt worries have also shaken the stock in recent weeks. Click to see whether this dip is worth buying.
#7 Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOGL)
Coatue Stake $1.74 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $472.5 Million
Coatue added 542,825 shares of Alphabet and held $1.74 billion, or 3.57% of its portfolio. Bridgewater trimmed 675,498 shares and held $472.5 million, or 1.94% of its portfolio. Claude’s AI portfolio named Alphabet its best performer this year. Find out what drove the gain here.
Alphabet is expanding beyond its traditional search business through AI chips, cloud computing and enterprise AI services. Google is broadening access to its custom TPU chips, with additional computing capacity expected to come online in 2027. Google Cloud management has highlighted attractive returns on AI infrastructure investments, with AI servers generating payback in less than two years and Google’s custom chips offering shorter payback periods than GPUs. More than half of Google Cloud’s revenue backlog is expected to convert into revenue within two years. Enterprise customers using Google’s AI products also purchase 1.8 times as many Google Cloud products, potentially increasing customer retention and switching costs. Meanwhile, competitive pricing for its Gemini AI models could encourage wider adoption. Google’s search business has also remained resilient despite growing competition from AI chatbots.
#6 Broadcom Inc. (NASDAQ:AVGO)
Coatue Stake $2.21 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $497.8 Million
Coatue added 342,979 shares of Broadcom and held $2.21 billion, or 4.54% of its portfolio. Bridgewater trimmed 517,457 shares and held $497.8 million, or 2.04% of its portfolio. Broadcom has lagged the market this year even though analysts expect its earnings to rise 71% in fiscal 2026. Read our full take on whether it is a buy here.
Broadcom is benefiting from strong demand for AI chips and networking equipment. In the fiscal third quarter of 2026, revenue jumped 85.5% year over year, while AI semiconductor revenue surged 221%. Management expects AI revenue to reach $115 billion in fiscal 2027 and $230 billion in 2028. Broadcom also generated $13.7 billion in quarterly free cash flow, representing a 46% margin. Unlike heavily indebted AI infrastructure providers such as CoreWeave, Broadcom can fund its capital investments through internally generated cash. Its stock has also declined roughly 30% from its previous peak, potentially creating an attractive entry point.
However, demand slowdown is a risk. If AI demand fails to justify these investments, chip orders could slow significantly. Growing sales of lower-margin custom AI chips could also pressure profitability. Valuation remains a concern, with Broadcom trading at 27.59 times forward earnings, nearly 28% above the sector median, although broadly in line with its five-year average. Its forward enterprise value-to-sales ratio is more than four times the sector median, leaving shares vulnerable if growth slows.
#5 GE Vernova Inc. (NYSE:GEV)
Coatue Stake $3.01 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $144.2 Million
GE Vernova makes the gas turbines and grid equipment that data centers need for power. Coatue trimmed 14,194 shares in the second quarter and held $3.01 billion, or 6.18% of its portfolio. Bridgewater trimmed 312,129 shares and held $144.2 million, or 0.59% of its portfolio. Bulls say the company’s order backlog for AI data center power outweighs a recent earnings miss. See the full breakdown here.
GE Vernova is positioned to benefit from surging electricity demand driven by AI data centers. US data center electricity consumption is projected to increase 130% by 2030, creating opportunities across power generation and grid infrastructure. GE Vernova’s gas turbine backlog and slot reservations reached 116 gigawatts, while data center orders exceeded $5 billion in the first half of 2026, more than double the total for 2025.
Second-quarter orders surged 88% year over year, lifting the company’s total backlog to $176 billion. Its businesses span gas turbines, transformers, substations and electrical equipment, allowing it to benefit from multiple stages of data center development. Growing equipment installations could also generate long-term maintenance and service revenue.
However, not all is good. GE Vernova’s valuation already reflects substantial growth expectations. The stock trades at 53.74 times forward non-GAAP earnings, compared with the sector median of 19.32 times. Its forward enterprise value-to-sales ratio of 4.52 is more than double the sector median. These premiums leave limited room for disappointment if AI-related electricity demand grows more slowly than anticipated. Supply chain constraints could also delay the conversion of GE Vernova’s substantial backlog into revenue.
#4 Applied Materials, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMAT)
Coatue Stake $3.05 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $210.7 Million
Applied Materials sells the equipment and services that chipmakers use to manufacture semiconductors. Coatue trimmed 1,034,719 shares and held $3.05 billion, or 6.26% of its portfolio. Bridgewater trimmed 268,492 shares and held $210.7 million, or 0.86% of its portfolio. Jim Cramer thinks there is more to the stock than its earnings multiple shows. Check what he said here.
Applied Materials makes the machines chipmakers use to build semiconductors. Without them, Nvidia, Micron and others could not produce the chips AI needs. Chip shortages are expected to last for years, with memory shortages forecast to run through 2030, so chipmakers must keep adding capacity. Cloud giants keep raising their AI spending, and asset managers are building new funds focused on data centers. In the latest quarter, margins and earnings grew faster than sales. The stock has fallen about 48% from its high, and its forward P/E has dropped from about 55 to 29.5, which gives long-term buyers a cheaper entry.
The bull case rests on AI demand lasting for years, and nobody can guarantee that. Some investors expect the boom to end quickly, and chip equipment orders can swing sharply when chipmakers pause spending. The stock is also very volatile, which makes it a poor fit for conservative investors. A valuation recovery, with the forward P/E climbing back toward 40, is not certain, and a lower multiple would cut any gains. A 48% drop can also mean the market sees a problem that the numbers do not yet show at Applied Materials.
#3 Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN)
Coatue Stake $2.82 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $482.8 Million
Coatue raised its Amazon stake by 50% in the second quarter, buying 3,904,033 shares, and held $2.82 billion, or 5.80% of its portfolio. Bridgewater cut 2,363,230 shares, which took the position from 4.08% to 1.98% of its portfolio. The stake is still worth $482.8 million. Amazon also ranks second on our list of President Trump and Nancy Pelosi’s top picks. Read why here.
Amazon owns huge data centers full of computers and rents them out over the internet through AWS, its cloud business. AI companies need an enormous amount of computing power, so they rent it from Amazon and pay every month, like tenants paying a landlord. AWS growth has sped up for five straight quarters, reaching 37% last quarter, and Amazon says its capacity is sold out through 2027. Customers have signed contracts for years of future use, and that backlog doubled in the first half of the year. Anthropic and OpenAI are two of the biggest tenants, and Amazon owns stakes in both, so it gets paid as their landlord and as an owner. Advertising adds another strong profit stream, up 26% last quarter.
Amazon is spending so much on new data centers that free cash flow has turned negative and its debt has grown. If AI demand slows, those buildings will be expensive to keep. Much of the backlog comes from OpenAI and Anthropic, two companies that spend far more than they earn. A possible Anthropic IPO, which would put a public price on Amazon’s stake, could also price below its last funding round. AI shopping agents could skip the sponsored products that drive most of Amazon’s ad revenue, and the FTC’s antitrust trial starts in March 2027 for Amazon.
#2 Micron Technology, Inc. (NASDAQ:MU)
Coatue Stake $3.63 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $134.7 Million
Micron makes the memory chips that go into data centers and AI servers. Coatue raised its stake by 1,794%, buying 2,976,338 shares, and the position grew from 0.19% to 7.46% of its portfolio. It was worth $3.63 billion at the end of the quarter. Bridgewater went the other way and trimmed 1,359,038 shares, which cut the weight from 2.23% to 0.55% of its portfolio. It held $134.7 million. A Chinese memory maker could match Micron’s DRAM wafer capacity by 2029, and that is the core of the bear case. Read the full bear case here.
Micron is trading at about 5 times forward earnings, against a sector median of 21.6. Its forward PEG ratio is 0.07, against 1.13 for the sector, and on trailing earnings it trades at 11.6 times, well below its five-year average of 18.3. Revenue grew 256% from a year ago, and earnings have surged with it.
But before you get too excited about the valuation, listen to the bear argument. Bears say a low P/E on record profits is a warning sign for a cyclical stock. They point to Micron’s own history, where strong earnings and a low P/E came before a big drop at least three times in the past decade. Fabs cost billions and take two to three years to build, so new supply from SK hynix and Chinese makers will arrive later, as it did after the PC era, the dot-com bubble, the 2017 cloud surge and the pandemic boom. Even bears say the shortage may last into 2028, but they expect the stock to peak before it ends, and Micron is already well below its June high. AI spending cannot grow forever, and the big spenders already have negative cash flow, which is a risk for Micron.
#1 Lam Research Corporation (NASDAQ:LRCX)
Coatue Stake $4.09 Billion | Bridgewater Stake $406.6 Million
Lam Research makes the machines that chipmakers use to build chips. It is Coatue’s second-largest position, at $4.09 billion or 8.41% of its portfolio, after Coatue trimmed 601,902 shares. Bridgewater trimmed 633,005 shares and held $406.6 million, or 1.67% of its portfolio. The stock was up about 73% for the year when we last covered it. Read our take on whether it is still a smart long-term AI pick here.
Lam Research makes the etching and deposition machines chipmakers use to build wafers. Advanced AI chips need more of those steps and take longer to make, so manufacturers need more equipment even if unit volumes stay the same. Bulls also see Lam as a shelter if the AI market cools. If AI chip prices fall as costs normalize while volumes rise, chipmakers still have to buy the machines to make them. Sales grew 54% last quarter, operating margins reached a record high, and the stock has fallen 29% since June, which gives new buyers a cheaper entry.
Guidance for the next quarter points to just 4.6% growth from the last one, after 22% in the September quarter, because unusually strong China orders are returning to normal. The stock fell about 12% on the report. China’s strength may only be a timing issue as chipmakers absorb equipment they already bought, and ASML and Applied Materials both say demand there remains strong. Even so, equipment orders come in lumps, and a real pullback in AI spending would hit Lam directly.
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