Buy 3 top stocks for $5,000 today and hold forever

Investing in the right growth stocks can help you build your retirement wealth. Companies that see their business growth above average are often in a competitive position, which leads to years of shareholder returns.

If you have something worth $5,000 or less that can withstand a long-term investment strategy, the opportunity to put that money into your job is attractive. To give you some ideas, read why three April Fools' Day contributors believe Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN),,,,, Mercadolibre (Nasdaq: Meli)and Shopping (Nasdaq: Shop) In the coming decades, the ability to provide reliable returns.

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John Ballard (Amazon): Amazon offers incredible returns for investors, and the recent pullback is a great opportunity to buy stocks at a more attractive valuation. Amazon has a variety of ways to drive growth to boost shareholder returns.

Amazon is known for its online store, which accounted for 37% of the U.S. e-commerce market in 2023, according to Statista. What appeals to Amazon's competitive position is that it generates many online sales from duplicate purchases of more than 200 million major members who pay subscription fees for free shipping and other benefits. This provides high visibility for future sales, which is often rewarded by investors' higher valuations.

Another reason Amazon is that the stock you can always hold is that it is a forward-looking company. Founder Jeff Bezos injects a culture of experimentation that is willing to take risks into the company. Large companies often fall into the defensive trap and do not take enough risks to continue innovating. Businesses that don’t continue to take risks are open to disruptive new entrants and provide consumers with something better.

Amazon will continue to win due to its investment in artificial intelligence (AI). Amazon Web Services (AWS) generated $112 billion in revenue last year, making it the leading provider of cloud services. Companies spend billions of dollars using AI with AWS to work with their data, and of course, Amazon is benefiting from the same technology.

Amazon has a huge opportunity to use robotics to reduce the cost of its online retail business, which could lead to substantial growth in revenue and cash flows. AI enables Amazon customers to order products using Alexa's sound. Customers have more than 600 million Alexa devices in their homes, enhancing Amazon's competitive advantage.

The company’s cost-reduction efforts have greatly increased its operating cash flow over the past few years, but the stock hasn’t caught up with what’s going on here. The stock has historically been about 27 times the cash transactions in operation, but investors can currently buy stocks at 20 times the cash flow.

Computer keyboard keys with shopping cart.
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Jennifer Sybre: Mercadolibre stock will definitely smash the market this year, up 48%, and S&P 500 Approximately flat. Nothing new. It usually beats the market because it shows amazing results and investors expect more.

The company sees huge market opportunities as its region gradually shifts towards the technological future. Its main business is e-commerce, and it also builds a strong fintech field through services such as credit cards and digital payments. The region's e-commerce market remains insufficient, leaving the United States behind about 10 years. 85% of retail sales are still happening offline, and Mercadolibre controls 5% of all retail industries in the region. It has over $500 million in the market with a total population and over $5 trillion in gross domestic product (GDP), and as a leader in the industry, it helps benefit from the transformation that also helps create. It enables more people to bring more people online. It offers free shipping and flexible shipping options and reduces the cost of supporting these and other programs. Despite its fierce competition and large scale, its total commodity sales (GMV) still outperforms its competitors in Mexico and Brazil. GMV's total year-on-year growth of 40% (monetary neutral).

This is a similar story about FinTech. Monthly active users grew 31% year-on-year, and management is launching products that can provide a better user experience to continue driving new businesses. It notes that its savings rate is benchmark or higher, while the majority of the population's funds are still in traditional banks that offer lower yields. Management's assets grew 103% year-on-year in the first quarter, resulting in a 75% increase in the overall credit portfolio.

These are incremental steps in a novel, each with huge sales and miscellaneous profits. As it continues to launch new products, improve its platform and capture market share, expect the stock to match its growth.

Jeremy Bowman (Shopify): Shopify basically invented e-commerce software. Founder Tobi Lütke created the original platform to help his snowboard shop and then realized that the software was a better business idea.

Over the past decade, Shopify has become the de facto platform for online sellers, achieving incredible growth, handling and assisting everything from payments to marketing to web design to implementation.

Today, Shopify continues to provide steady growth and is undergoing new technological innovations such as AI.

In the first quarter, revenue rose 27% to $2.36 billion, with a significant increase in profit margins as it reported net income excluding $226 million in equity investments, with a profit margin of nearly 10%.

Shopify's total commodity volume (GMV) growth remains impressive, up 23% from a quarter a year ago. Shopify's leadership in the industry empowers it to pricing power, and the company should be able to continue ordering pricing tiers as needed to increase prices.

The company is also investing in AI, adding value propositions to its products, such as Shopify Magic, a suite of AI-powered tools for handling product descriptions, changing image backgrounds, getting FAQ suggestions, helping customers with email communications, and handling things like live chat.

Shopify has long been at the forefront of e-commerce technology, and the increase in Shopify Magic can only make this reputation enjoyed.

If you have $5,000 investment, Shopify is down about 15% from its peak a few weeks ago, and looks as good as long-term investors.

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John Mackey, former CEO of Amazon's subsidiary Whole Foods Market, is a member of the board of directors of Motley Fool. Jennifer Saibil's position in Mixed Fat. Jeremy Bowman has positions at Amazon, grocery stores and Shopify. John Ballard has a place in Mercadolibre. Motley fool has a place and recommends Amazon, Mercadolibre and Shopify. Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Buy 3 top stocks for $5,000 today, and Hold Forever was originally published by Motley Fool