Last week, I revealed five “jackpot” stocks to buy for 2024. These longshot bets all had enormous potential… and also all the risks associated with early stage startups.
Happily, one of these stocks has already notched double-digit gains. Plug Power (NASDAQ:PLUG) is now up 28% since Monday on renewed interest in “meme” stocks. On average, we’ve seen almost 5% profits in a flat market.
- Plug Power (PLUG): +28%
- Joby Aviation (NYSE:JOBY): +14.5%
- Lucid Group (NASDAQ:LCID): +7%
- Soleno Therapeutics (NASDAQ:SLNO): +4%
- Terran Orbital (NYSE:LLAP): -1.5%
- Average: 10.3%
These early gains are essential for these moonshot stocks – high-potential firms that often require enormous amounts of external funding. Firms like Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) and Tesla (NASDAQ:TSLA) relied on high share prices to raise billions to build their dreams. (Neither of these companies was on particularly firm footing to start.) And it’s why investment banks try to target a large IPO “pop” to convey the image of success.
The recent return of meme stocks highlights this fact. Struggling videogame retailer GameStop (NYSE:GME) used the 2021 r/WallStreetBets stock mania on Reddit to issue $1.7 billion in new shares to eliminate its debt and provide a financial cushion. Its shares have risen 25% this week on renewed speculative interest. And Dogecoin (DOGE-USD) – a cryptocurrency with no significant real-world use – has seen its price surge 40% in just over a month. When it comes to profitless assets, the perception of future success matters more than anything. And we’re seeing a lot of that going into the New Year.
Conservative investors might shake their heads at this logic. To them, venture capital (and meme stocks) is one big casino where luck matters far more than skill. They’ll rightly point out that some startups, like blood-testing firm Theranos, don’t even bother with making a working product before pitching the idea to investors.
But landing a single early stage win can turn a small investment into billions. SoftBank turned every $1 million invested into Alibaba (NYSE:BABA) into $1.3 billion. And Peter Thiel’s initial $500,000 seed in Facebook was worth over $1 billion by the time he sold out.
That’s why I’d like to highlight another five “jackpot” stocks that our writers at InvestorPlace.com have highlighted this week. Because when you’re buying stocks that can rise 5X… 10X… 100X… you only need to land one winner to turn an ordinary portfolio into an extraordinary nest egg.
5 Jackpot Stocks to Buy for 2024: Blink Charging (BLNK)
Shares of electric vehicle charging company Blink Charging (NASDAQ:BLNK) surged 40% this month after reporting stellar revenue growth. As Faisal Humayun notes in a recent update at InvestorPlace.com, the Miami Beach-based firm generated $43.4 million in sales, 152% year-over-year growth. Gross margins also expanded 175 basis points to 29.5%.
Most importantly, Blink Charging is seeing a surge in its DC fast charging business – a segment that’s starting to overtake others. Rival ChargePoint Holdings (NYSE:CHPT), for instance, has already seen shares plummet 35% over the same period after cutting its revenue guidance by roughly 30% on Nov. 17.
Together, that makes Blink Charging one of Humayun’s top picks for 2024:
I expect BLNK stock to remain in an uptrend in the coming quarters… As the Company’s product portfolio expands, revenue growth will likely remain stellar. Increasing presence in Europe will also boost growth.
A rising share price also puts Blink in a far better position. Electric charging stations are capital-intensive businesses, and Blink’s rising share price will allow it to raise money with less dilution. If things go well, investors can expect this $230 million market-cap stock to rise 10X or more as the company continues to beat the competition in higher-end DC charging stations.
2. Robinhood (HOOD)
In 2021, investors sent shares of stock trading firm Robinhood Markets (NASDAQ:HOOD) into the $50 range. A new generation of day traders had just discovered the joys of stock speculation, and Robinhood’s free trading platform found itself in the right place, at the right time. It seemed as if Robinhood’s stock could do no wrong.
Fast forward to 2023, and the tables have turned. Speculators have moved onto other meme bets, and Robinhood now trades like a value stock. Its $9 shares barely trade above tangible book value.
Joel Baglole now sees this as an opportunity for investors to double their money. And if markets surge in 2024, he writes at InvestorPlace.com, the gains could be even greater.
Robinhood Markets has potential, especially if the stock market and cryptocurrency rallies gather steam in 2024. The online brokerage and trading app performs best when markets are in a frenzy, which is what happened two years ago. The bear market of 2022 crushed HOOD stock and it is only now starting to recover…
At $8 a share and near a 52-week low, HOOD stock looks cheap. If you are looking for undervalued growth stocks, start here.
Value investors will also appreciate Robinhood’s ability to earn interest on customer deposits. The firm now holds $8.7 billion in cash and short-term investments, which generates $251 million of interest every quarter.
That means investors buying Robinhood today are essentially purchasing a middling trading platform for $9 per share, and getting a potential meme stock on top of that. Shares could theoretically rise back to $20 next year.
3. Opera (OPRA)
Louis Navellier and his team have consistently identified internet browser firm Opera (NASDAQ:OPRA) as a high-quality play on AI. Opera’s Aria browser sports generative AI capabilities, and the company has turned innovations like these into real-life growth and profits.
This week at InvestorPlace.com, Yiannis Zourmpanos joins Louis and his team in recommending the Norway-based firm.
Opera focuses on attracting higher-value users, particularly in Western markets. It leads to an 11% growth in Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) compared to the prior quarter and a 24% year-over-year increase to $1.31…
Additionally, Aria, Opera’s AI-driven browser, represents a strategic area of focus aimed at enhancing user experiences…
Finally, Opera Ads serves as a pivotal revenue enabler, catering to a vast user base of hundreds of millions of Opera users. Opera Ads enables advertisers to reach a global audience through real-time bidding and partner inventories.
Fundamentally, Opera has figured out how to recapture ad dollars from Google and other online advertisers. The company now generates more sales from advertising than from search.
Opera also has focused its attention on wealthier markets. Though total monthly active users declined between 2021 and 2022, revenue dollars from each user more than doubled to $1.18 during that period. (Opera’s monthly users have since increased again.)
That makes Opera a jackpot stock to watch. Though its fight for browser dominance is far from over, the company’s early successes are giving it the financial firepower to reinvest in R&D to keep growing.
4. Ballard Power (BLDP)
Matthew Farley adds Ballard Power Systems (NASDAQ:BLDP) to his list of high-potential hydrogen stocks this week. In his writeup at InvestorPlace.com, he notes that “explosive” revenue growth makes this firm worthy of consideration.
Ballard Power is recognized for its zero-emission proton exchange membrane fuel cells, which are used in commercial vehicles and marine vessels…
Ballard Power Systems’ Q3 report showed a significant increase in revenue, driven by demand in the heavy-duty mobility sector. Despite a reported net loss due to restructuring changes, the company is well positioned moving forward thanks to its substantial order backlog and strategic partnerships.
In short, Ballard Power is one of the oldest companies in the fuel cell industry, with a focus on heavy-duty vehicles. Its fuel cells for buses are furthest along, with truck fuel cells following closely behind. The company is also exploring fuel cell use in rail and marine.
The company’s proton-exchange membrane (PEM) hydrogen fuel cells have significant size advantages over traditional lithium-ion batteries. Far more energy can be stored in hydrogen cells than in batteries, which increases the space and weight available for cargo. (The lithium-ion batteries in an H2 Hummer, for instance, weigh as much as an ordinary sedan.) A recent bottoming out of share prices also suggests that much of the selloff is now complete.
That makes Ballard Power a significant “jackpot” stock to watch. Though the company faces enormous competition from better-capitalized rivals, its singular focus on the PEM technology gives it the 10X potential that those rivals lack.
5. Precigen (PGEN)
InvestorPlace.com writer Gabriel Osorio-Mazzilli identifies Precigen (NASDAQ:PGEN) as a stock to buy this week following updates about the firm’s flagship PRGN-2012 therapy, an immunotherapy drug that targets recurrent respiratory papillomatosis (RRP). It’s a rare disorder, but positive results from a Phase 1 study were enough for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to award Precigen with a “breakthrough” designation last summer.
Precigen has also seen a flurry of insider buying – one of the best predictors of biotech success. Insiders at these healthcare startups often have a good idea of clinical trial outcomes well before the results are published, and so cluster buying tends to be a strong buy signal. An investigation by ProPublica earlier this year has since found even more evidence that insiders at biotech and other small healthcare enterprises “stood out for both [their] frequency and variety of questionable trades.”
Of course, we’re not suggesting that you trade on illegally acquired insider information. Trading on nonpublic preliminary clinical trial is against U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rules. But following the lead of publicly disclosed trades remains entirely legal.
That’s why investors should pay close attention to the four insiders who have recently bought shares of Precigen in the $1.50-$1.75 range this fall. These directors have spent $2.4 million of their own money to increase their stakes, suggesting they probably knew something we don’t. And with shares now at around $1.15, Precigen’s stock could be a multibagger hiding in plain sight.
The High-Quality Startups Hiding in Plain Sight
If you think early stage investing seems risky, you’d be right. Many startups don’t even have products yet, let alone working business models. The first investors in Google bought in even before the firm incorporated. And you never know when you’ll land on the next fraud like Theranos.
But having even a tiny “edge” in identifying moonshot winners can put you on the fast track to success. The two original investors in Google were Stanford University Professor David Cheriton and Sun Microsystems founder Andy Bechtolsheim. They knew Google’s founders were onto something big. And it’s why venture capital investors pay so much attention to what other top angel investors are doing. It’s like biotech insiders buying shares of companies they know so well.
That’s why you should pay particular attention to Luke Lango’s most recent discovery: a “jackpot” investment method that can pay up to 100 times more than regular stocks… and where you can score big whether the market is up or down.
For a limited time, Luke Lango is showing you the secret of how to get into these assets now. Click to learn all the details.
On the date of publication, Tom Yeung did not hold (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.
