Tariffs on U.S. imports are now at their steepest level since the 1930s, shaking up supply chains, and adding fuel to inflation worries. At the same time, Trump has sought to tighten his grip on the Fed by firing Fed governor Lisa Cook from the central bank’s board of governors, against a backdrop of ongoing clashes with Chair Jerome Powell. But periodic blips aside, the markets have barely skipped a beat, having taken all the upheaval in their stride.
Elevate Your Investing Strategy:
- Take advantage of TipRanks Premium at 50% off! Unlock powerful investing tools, advanced data, and expert analyst insights to help you invest with confidence.
After sliding in April when Trump first rolled out his broad tariff plan, the S&P 500 not only clawed back those losses but has since pushed to new highs; the index now sits near a recent peak and up 8.5% for the year.
To billionaire investor Ken Fisher, that response fits the pattern of a bull market. He notes that while headlines may scream turmoil, forward-looking stocks tend to discount worst-case scenarios well before they play out.
“Are stocks ignoring reality? Or gorging on empty calories of ‘TACO’ (Trump Always Chickens Out) trading – or getting bloated from frothy meme stocks?” Fisher, who has a net worth of $13.2 billion and is the executive chairman and co-chief investment officer of Fisher Investments, asked rhetorically. “Bears believe that since world stocks’ rally quickly reversed 2025’s early-year correction. The reality is way simpler: forward-looking stocks pre-priced a worst-case tariff scenario in the spring that never arrived. A better-than-feared world is now taking shape. In any bull market, that is all stocks need to rally.”
As far as Fisher is concerned, in an ongoing bull market, while pruning the portfolio a little makes sense, it’s best to hold on to the biggest winners; that’s exactly what he’s been doing with his holdings of the world’s two most valuable companies – Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) and Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT).
So, let’s get the lowdown on these two market giants, and by delving into the TipRanks database, we can see whether the Street’s analysts also think it’s a good idea to be hanging on to these names right now.
Nvidia
No other company has defined the current bull market more than Nvidia, right now the world’s most valuable company and in a sense the ultimate AI play. Nvidia has become the picks and shovels provider of the AI era – selling the essential chips that power the tech, no matter which company ultimately comes out on top.
It has been a stunning story of a firm rising to dominate an industry it never specifically set out to lead. Nvidia started as a pioneer in GPUs for gamers, but those same chips turned out to be perfectly suited for the massive computing power that artificial intelligence demands.
And once the pivot was made, the scene was set for massive gains – both in the real world and for the share price. Its AI chips quickly became the industry benchmark, but the edge goes deeper than hardware. With its CUDA software as the standard for AI development, Nvidia has built a full-stack setup that’s hard for anyone else to match, tying together the tools and the infrastructure that power modern AI.
The stock market success has been built on a series of outstanding quarterly results, all fueling the share price’s monstrous climb. That said, the company’s recent fiscal second quarter readout left investors wanting more and the shares uncharacteristically drifted south in the aftermath. The problem for Nvidia is that the bar has been set so high, that even solid results across the board won’t do anymore.
In FQ2, revenue came in at $46.74 billion, up 55.6% year-over-year and beating expectations by $610 million. Adj. EPS reached $1.05, $0.04 above the forecast. Looking ahead to FQ3, the company expects revenue around $54 billion at the midpoint, compared with consensus at $52.76 billion. Notably, this outlook doesn’t factor in any H20 shipments to China, meaning potential sales to that market could boost revenue further if trade or regulatory conditions allow.
Against this backdrop, Fisher still holds a sizeable position. While he sold 8,229,696 shares in Q2, or ~10% of his stake, he still holds 82,511,422 shares, currently worth ~$14 billion.
And Wall Street remains broadly bullish. For William Blair analyst Sebastien Naji, the Nvidia story is still one worth getting exposure to.
“While China revenue remains an overhang, Nvidia is benefiting from robust data center growth stemming from growing demand for compute. We see room for Nvidia to maintain robust growth, underpinned by continued hyperscaler spending as well as accelerating momentum from neocloud, sovereign, and even enterprise customers. With supply for the higher priced GB300 NVL72 racks increasing going into the second half of fiscal 2026, and Rubin chips on track for its planned ramp-up in mid2026, we continue to see a favorable risk/reward equation for shares. Shares of Nvidia trade at a price-to-earnings multiple of 39 times our calendar 2025 estimate and 29 times our calendar 2026 estimate,” Naji noted.
Accordingly, Naji rates the stock as Outperform (i.e., Buy) with a ‘fair value’ of price of $212, implying the shares will post growth of 22% in the months ahead. (To watch Naji’s track record, click here)
Amongst Naji’s colleagues, 33 others also sing Nvidia’s praises while the addition of 3 Holds and 1 Sell can’t detract from a Strong Buy consensus rating. Going by the $210.75 average price target, a year from now, shares will be changing hands for a ~25% premium. (See NVDA stock forecast)
Microsoft
From the world’s most valuable company, let’s now check out the one trailing in its wake, the second most valuable – Microsoft. That quirk aside, it is fitting in another way to pair these together. If Nvidia represents AI’s pick and shovels play, Microsoft is focused on building the tools and platforms that put that power to work. Its cloud services and AI integrations are turning all that computing into practical applications, and its partnership with ChatGPT maker OpenAI has put it at the center of the AI landscape, giving it a leading role in how the tech reaches businesses and everyday users.
The fear around Microsoft has been that, despite all the investment, the payoff hasn’t fully materialized yet. While the company has poured billions into AI and its partnership with OpenAI, skeptics worry that translating that spending into meaningful revenue growth will take time.
While that is a valid concern, the tech giant’s most recent quarterly results offered another display of highly impressive strength. Revenue came in at $76.4 billion, up 18.1% YoY, and ahead of the estimates by $2.57 billion. EPS reached $3.65, $0.27 above expectations. Adding to the positive momentum, Azure revenue growth picked up for a second consecutive quarter, rising 39% in constant currency – well above both the high end of the guide at 34–35% and the Street’s forecast of 34%. Looking ahead to Q1, the company expects total revenue between $74.7 billion and $75.8 billion, surpassing the analysts’ estimate of $74.15 billion.
It’s hardly surprising to find Fisher has a sizable stake here. He owns 24,297,369 MSFT shares, even after selling 900,270 in Q2 – representing a 4% trim. These holdings are currently worth ~$12 billion.
On Wall Street, this tech leader has the support of D.A. Davidson analyst Gil Luria, who points out the importance of the OpenAI relationship.
“Microsoft’s partnership with OpenAI is driving significant gains throughout the business,” the 5-star analyst said. “Particularly with Azure, Microsoft’s agreement terms with OpenAI, which grants them right-of-first-refusal on either training or inference, we believe is a notable driver of the recent outperformance by Azure over its hyperscaler peers. Additionally, as we called out last month with our DaVinci Developer Data, we saw material acceleration of Azure OpenAI Services in F4Q25, which is uplifting other AI services and core hyperscaler services on Azure, both of which are growing faster than comparable product sets on either GCP or AWS.”
Quantifying his stance, Luria rates the shares a Buy while his $650 price target points toward 12-month returns of ~30%. (To watch Luria’s track record, click here)
Almost all of Luria’s colleagues agree with that stance; while one analyst maintains a Hold rating, all 33 others are positive, naturally making the consensus view a Strong Buy. The average target stands at $624.08, implying shares will climb ~25% higher over the next year. (See MSFT stock forecast)
To find good ideas for stocks trading at attractive valuations, visit TipRanks’ Best Stocks to Buy, a tool that unites all of TipRanks’ equity insights.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the featured analysts. The content is intended to be used for informational purposes only. It is very important to do your own analysis before making any investment.