The stock market has been in rough trouble lately as investors grapple with macroeconomic pressures, upcoming elections and geopolitical tensions.
But investors and their portfolios can weather the turmoil — if they’re able to ignore the short-term noise and pick stocks with attractive long-term return prospects.
In this regard, the ratings of leading Wall Street analysts and their investment theses can provide useful information and help us make the right decisions.
With that in mind, here are three stocks favored by the The leading street professionalsaccording to TipRanks, a platform that ranks analysts based on their past performance.
Costco Wholesale
Subscription-only warehouse chain Costco Wholesale (COST) is this week’s first pick. The company recently announced its June sales and announced an increase in its member membership. Costco is raising the annual fee for its “Gold Star” membership by $5 to $65, effective September 1st. Additionally, the premium “Executive Membership” fee will now cost $130, up from $120.
Reacting to Costco’s first membership increase since June 2017, Jefferies analyst Corey Tarlow reiterated a buy rating on COST stock and raised its price target to $1,050 from $860, saying the stock remains a top pick. The analyst believes that membership growth is a favorable catalyst for the company’s stock and earnings.
Tarlowe noted that in the past, Costco has increased its members’ memberships every 5.5 years, on average. However, this time, the retailer has increased the fee after a gap of seven years. He believes the timing of the fee increase is good given the steady membership the company is experiencing and strong June numbers.
“Historically, COST has not had a significant impact on member trends when fees increase, so we believe the impact will diminish,” Tarlowe said.
The analyst expects the higher fee to boost sales and earnings before interest and taxes, as the membership fee accounts for a significant portion of Costco’s steadily growing operating profit. It estimates a potential benefit of nearly 3% to the company’s earnings per share for each of the next two years.
Tarlowe is ranked No. 321 among more than 8,900 analysts tracked by TipRanks. Its ratings were profitable 67% of the time, yielding an average return of 18.8%. (I see Costco Dividends on TipRanks)
MongoDB
Next is the database software company MongoDB (MDB). The stock took a dive in May after the company announced weak guidance for the fiscal second quarter and lowered its full-year outlook. MongoDB blamed a slower-than-expected start to the year on both new workload wins and increased consumption of its cloud-based database software that Atlas offers.
Tigress Financial analyst Ivan Fineseth recently cut its price target on MDB stock to $400 from $500 to reflect near-term pressures, but reaffirmed a buy rating as it views the sell-off in the stock as a good buying opportunity.
Despite a weak start to the year, Feinseth is bullish on MongoDB as the company continues to gain traction among developers. He also cited growing momentum for MDB’s Atlas DBaaS (database as a service) product.
He expects the company to benefit from incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) into its offerings. “MDB’s integration of new AI capabilities improves developer productivity, accelerates application development, and accelerates rapid enterprise adoption trends,” said Feinseth.
The analyst also highlighted the company’s expansion into other major industries, including healthcare, insurance, manufacturing and auto manufacturing. He is optimistic about the prospects of MDB’s stable DBaaS platform, given its superior functionality and cost advantages compared to traditional database solutions.
Feinseth is ranked No. 191 among more than 8,900 analysts tracked by TipRanks. Its evaluations were successful 62% of the time, with an average performance of 13.6%. (I see MongoDB stock acquisitions on TipRanks)
Nvidia
Semiconductor giant Nvidia (NVDA) is this week’s third pick. The wave of artificial intelligence production has significantly increased the demand for the company’s advanced graphics processing units. Even after the stock’s impressive year-to-date rally, Goldman Sachs analyst Toshiya Hari he thinks he has more room to run.
After meeting with Nvidia CFO Colette Kress, Hari reiterated a buy rating on the stock with a $135 price target. The analyst said the meeting reinforced his “belief in the sustainability of the current Gen AI spending cycle.” The meeting also reassured the analyst about NVDA’s potential to maintain its dominance through strong innovation in computing, networking and software.
Commenting on Nvidia’s next-generation AI graphics processor Blackwell, the analyst reported that the CFO had said that the company’s key suppliers are better positioned for the Blackwell ramp than previous generations. Hari expects significant revenue contribution from the Blackwell platform in 4Q25 and 1Q26, but sees limited contribution in 3Q25.
The analyst is confident that despite increasing competition, Nvidia will continue to maintain its leadership position based on several factors, including a large installed base and better access to supply. Additionally, the rapid speed at which large enterprises and cloud service providers are building and deploying productive AI models gives Nvidia an advantage over competitors that are still developing advanced AI GPUs.
Harry is ranked #30 among more than 8,900 analysts tracked by TipRanks. Its ratings were profitable 69% of the time, yielding an average return of 30.2%. (I see Nvidia options activity on TipRanks)
