Analysts' Top S&P 500 Stocks to Buy Now
Amazon, Microsoft and Delta Air Lines make the list of stocks scoring rare Strong Buy consensus ratings.
If the idea is to buy low, then going shopping for stocks when markets are at record highs might not seem like the greatest idea. But there are always select names set to outperform — and that's especially true when market leadership is comparatively narrow.
Although select members of the Magnificent 7 stocks have done much of the bull market's heavy lifting, that hardly means these names are doomed to underperform from here. Indeed, as we'll see below, three of Wall Street's top five stocks to buy now hail from the Magnificent 7. Companies from the real estate, oil & gas and, uh, french fry sectors are also ably represented.
Here's how we found the top S&P 500 stocks to buy now. It's well known that industry analysts are reluctant to slap Sell ratings on the names they cover. There are a bunch of reasons for this, some more defensible than others. What's less commonly understood is that Strong Buy recommendations, while not as rare as Sell calls, are in short supply too.
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If you run a screen of the S&P 500 using data from S&P Global Market Intelligence, you'll see that analysts assign a consensus recommendation of Sell to a total of three stocks. At the other end of the rating spectrum stands the Street's highest recommendation of Strong Buy. A total of 19 stocks make the cut there, as you can see in the chart below.
But first a note on our methodology: S&P Global Market Intelligence surveys analysts' stock recommendations and scores them on a five-point scale, where 1.0 equals Strong Buy and 5.0 means Strong Sell. Any score of 2.5 or lower means that analysts, on average, rate the stock a Buy. The closer the score gets to 1.0, the stronger the Buy call. In other words, lower scores are better than higher scores.
Have a look at the chart below to see the 19 stocks in the S&P 500 that score an elite Strong Buy recommendation from industry analysts. Investors who fear it's too late to buy Amazon.com (AMZN), Microsoft (MSFT) or Nvidia (NVDA) will be happy to see they easily made the list.
Company (ticker) | Analysts' consensus recommendation score | Analysts' consensus recommendation |
---|---|---|
Amazon.com (AMZN) | 1.30 | Strong Buy |
Microsoft (MSFT) | 1.32 | Strong Buy |
Delta Air Lines (DAL) | 1.35 | Strong Buy |
Nvidia (NVDA) | 1.38 | Strong Buy |
Alexandria Real Estate Equities (ARE) | 1.39 | Strong Buy |
DexCom (DXCM) | 1.42 | Strong Buy |
Lamb Weston (LW) | 1.42 | Strong Buy |
Bio-Techne (TECH) | 1.43 | Strong Buy |
Elevance Health (ELV) | 1.46 | Strong Buy |
Targa Resources (TRGP) | 1.46 | Strong Buy |
NiSource (NI) | 1.46 | Strong Buy |
SLB (SLB) | 1.47 | Strong Buy |
Las Vegas Sands (LVS) | 1.47 | Strong Buy |
UnitedHealth Group (UNH) | 1.48 | Strong Buy |
Uber Technologies (UBER) | 1.49 | Strong Buy |
Assurant (AIZ) | 1.50 | Strong Buy |
Bio-Rad Laboratories (BIO) | 1.50 | Strong Buy |
Mastercard (MA) | 1.50 | Strong Buy |
Mondelez (MDLZ) | 1.50 | Strong Buy |
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Dan Burrows is Kiplinger's senior investing writer, having joined the august publication full time in 2016.
A long-time financial journalist, Dan is a veteran of SmartMoney, MarketWatch, CBS MoneyWatch, InvestorPlace and DailyFinance. He has written for The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Consumer Reports, Senior Executive and Boston magazine, and his stories have appeared in the New York Daily News, the San Jose Mercury News and Investor's Business Daily, among other publications. As a senior writer at AOL's DailyFinance, Dan reported market news from the floor of the New York Stock Exchange and hosted a weekly video segment on equities.
Once upon a time – before his days as a financial reporter and assistant financial editor at legendary fashion trade paper Women's Wear Daily – Dan worked for Spy magazine, scribbled away at Time Inc. and contributed to Maxim magazine back when lad mags were a thing. He's also written for Esquire magazine's Dubious Achievements Awards.
In his current role at Kiplinger, Dan writes about equities, fixed income, currencies, commodities, funds, macroeconomics, demographics, real estate, cost of living indexes and more.
Dan holds a bachelor's degree from Oberlin College and a master's degree from Columbia University.
Disclosure: Dan does not trade stocks or other securities. Rather, he dollar-cost averages into cheap funds and index funds and holds them forever in tax-advantaged accounts.
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