The technology sector promises to revolutionise the way we work, interact, and go about our daily lives.
The advent of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in late 2022 has made our lives more efficient and also altered the way organisations approach data and analysis.
It’s still early days for this sector as many more advancements and discoveries may be on the horizon.
The recent release of China’s DeepSeek showcases how AI development could be much cheaper than expected, and thus spur an explosion in the number of firms that pursue AI.
Here are four compelling US technology stocks that you can add to your buy watchlist to enjoy long-term capital appreciation.
Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META)
Meta Platforms is a social media company that owns Instagram, WhatsApp, and Facebook.
The company has said that it will spend “hundreds of billions” of dollars on AI infrastructure over the long term, and is doubling down on data centre developments.
Meta Platforms reported a strong set of earnings for 2024.
Revenue rose 22% year on year to US$164.5 billion while operating profit jumped 48% year on year to US$69.4 billion.
The social media behemoth saw its net profit surge by 59% year on year to US$62.4 billion.
Meta Platforms also generated a positive free cash flow of US$54.1 billion for 2024, up 22.7% year on year.
The business declared a quarterly dividend of US$0.50 for the fourth quarter of 2024 (4Q 2024), unchanged from a year ago.
Meta Platforms saw continued growth in its Family daily active people (DAP), rising by 5% year on year to 3.35 billion.
The average price per ad also increased by 10% year on year for 2024.
The CFO expects Meta Platforms’ investments to generate strong revenue growth for 2025 and capital expenditures for generative AI efforts will be in the range of between US$60 to US$65 billion.
Palantir (NYSE: PLTR)
Palantir offers its software platforms to corporate and government clients for big data analytics to derive insights.
The company leverages AI to enable its clients to work better with data and enhance their analytical capabilities.
Palantir reported strong revenue growth of 28.8% year on year to US$2.9 billion for 2024.
Operating profit soared 159% year on year to US$310.4 million while net profit more than doubled year on year to US$462.2 million.
The technology giant also generated a positive free cash flow of US$1.1 billion, up an impressive 64% year on year.
In 4Q 2024 alone, the company closed 129 deals of at least US$1 million and 32 deals of at least US$10 million.
Palantir’s total customer count grew 43% year on year to 711, of which commercial customers made up 571 for a 52% year-on-year increase.
For 2025, the company expects its revenue to be in the range of US$3.741 billion and US$3.757 billion, representing growth of 29% year on year at the midpoint.
Oracle (NYSE: ORCL)
Oracle is a software company that offers AI-powered cloud applications (Oracle Cloud) and also offers the world’s first autonomous database.
The company also offers integrated suites of applications on its cloud server.
Oracle saw continued growth as it reported its first half of fiscal 2025 (1H FY2025) earnings for the period ending 30 November 2024.
Total revenue rose 8% year on year to US$27.4 billion while operating profit climbed 19% year on year to US$8.2 billion.
Net profit increased by 24% year on year to US$6.1 billion.
A quarterly dividend of US$0.40 was declared and paid, unchanged from the prior year.
In particular, management highlighted that record AI demand pushed the company’s Oracle Cloud Infrastructure revenue up 52% year on year in the second quarter of fiscal 2025 (2Q FY2025).
Graphics processing unit (GPU) consumption was up 336% during the quarter and Oracle saw its remaining performance obligations climb 50% year on year to US$97 billion.
As Oracle Cloud Infrastructure serves the world’s most important generative AI models, management expects this division to continue demonstrating healthy growth.
Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT)
Microsoft is a trillion-dollar software company that creates platforms and tools powered by AI to deliver solutions to its customers.
Microsoft operates a cloud service (Microsoft Cloud) and also owns LinkedIn, a professional networking site, along with its famous suite of word processing, presentation, and spreadsheet tools Microsoft Office 365.
The software giant released a robust set of earnings for its first half of fiscal 2025 (1H FY2025) ending 31 December 2024.
Revenue climbed 14.1% year on year to US$135.2 billion.
Operating profit rose 15.4% year on year to US$62.2 billion while net profit increased by 10.4% year on year to US$48.8 billion.
Microsoft also churned out US$25.7 billion of free cash flow for 1H FY2025, although this was lower than the previous year’s US$29.8 billion because of higher capital expenditures.
The latest quarterly dividend stood at US$0.83, a 10.7% year-on-year increase from US$0.75.
Microsoft’s AI business has surpassed an annual revenue run rate of US$13 billion and is up 175% year on year.
The technology giant is committed to investing US$80 billion in FY2025 to further its AI ambition.
This investment is for building AI-enabled data centres to train AI models and propagate them around the world.
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Disclosure: Royston Yang owns shares of Meta Platforms.
