Qualcomm Emerges as one of Best Tech Stock with 47% YTD & 24% Gain in May
There has been a tremendous rise in the market interest in semiconductors since last year, turning into an investment spree this year. A number of companies besides NVIDIA has benefitted from this market awareness and have seen stock prices going up consistently. Qualcomm Inc (QCOM) is one such major semiconductor player that is benefitting from both the growing market for mobile solutions as well as from the generative AI solutions becoming popular in mobile devices. Qualcomm leads tech stocks in the US on Nasdaq with its superlative performance. Qualcomm is now one of the best tech stocks of 2024 with 47% YTD price gains.
Qualcomm stock price has been continuously surging this year with a few minor price corrections fueling another round of bull-run. QCOM started the year at $140 on 2 Jan and scaled to $163 by the end of Mar itself. In May the stock witnessed hectic buying which resulted in a 24% price gain in the month alone.
Table: Best Tech Stock of 2024
| Company | Symbol | 02 Jan | 28-Jun | YTD Growth % | Apr-Jun Qtr Growth | Jun Growth % |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| NVIDIA Corp | NVDA | 48.2 | 123.5 | 156% | 37% | 7% |
| Micron Technology Inc | MU | 82.3 | 131.5 | 60% | 6% | 3% |
| Crowdstrike Holdings Inc | CRWD | 246.9 | 383.2 | 55% | 20% | 24% |
| Applied Materials Inc | AMAT | 154.4 | 236.0 | 53% | 13% | 10% |
| Arista Networks Inc | ANET | 231.6 | 350.5 | 51% | 17% | 18% |
| Broadcom Inc | AVGO | 1,085.4 | 1,605.5 | 48% | 19% | 21% |
| KLA Corp | KLAC | 560.4 | 824.5 | 47% | 16% | 9% |
| ASML Holding NV | ASML | 716.9 | 1,022.7 | 43% | 3% | 6% |
| Lam Research Corp | LRCX | 749.3 | 1,064.9 | 42% | 8% | 14% |
| QUALCOMM Inc | QCOM | 140.2 | 199.2 | 42% | 16% | -3% |
Financial Performance: Qualcomm demonstrated a robust financial performance, marked by a significant year-over-year growth in revenue and profits. QCOM revenues grew by 1.2% Y-O-Y basis to reach $9.3 Bn in Mar 2024. Qualcomm’s Net profit margin rose to 24% on Y-O-Y basis in Mar 2024. QCOM’s EPS grew stupendously by 35% Y-O-Y to $ 2.4, which also ignited active interest form the retail buyers.
There seems to be a huge cascading impact of NVIDIA run on other semiconductor stocks as investors are buying on high expectation on semiconductor evolution on the back of AI growth changing market dynamics completely.
Qualcomm Inc Vs NVIDIA: Despite the fact that both NVIDIA & Qualcomm are from semiconductors space, there are major differences in their areas of operations –
- NVIDIA focuses on GPU for gaming & AI processing while Qualcomm is into mobile chipsets
- NVIDIA is dependent on the prospect of Generative AI in computing solutions while Qualcomm is dependent on mobile technology – 5G/LTE.
- NVIDIA sells its processors for gaming and data centres while QCOM sells chips to mobile manufacturers.