5 Tech Stocks to Buy Powering the Next Leg of the AI Boom

Christopher Nolan’s younger brother Jonathan once revealed something that peeked behind the curtain on his older brother’s entire filmography: “Chris doesn’t make movies about time. He makes movies about anxiety… about how to survive when time runs out.”

When you think of a Nolan film, it’s the execution that often grabs the headline. Memento was a story told in reverse. Inception was folded inside of dreams. Interstellar bended across time and galaxies. Dunkirk‘s narrative spread across three increasingly compressed timelines. Tenet was quite literally inverted. On the surface, these look like five completely different films… a thriller, a heist, a space epic, a war movie, a spy puzzle. But underneath, they’re all about racing the clock.

The best investors think the same way.

Here’s the problem with how most people are playing the AI boom right now: they see five different stocks and assume they’re five different trades. Quantum computing over here. Food delivery over there. Infrastructure silicon. CPUs and GPUs. Social media data.

But they’re not separate. They’re chapters of the same story… and the story is about who owns the infrastructure, the data, the compute, and the physical world before the AI buildout fully prices in.

The proof is sitting in last week’s first-quarter 2026 earnings reports. Hyperscaler capex is ramping up, not slowing down. Inferencing workloads are exploding. Quantum computing just crossed from science lab to commercial reality with triple-digit revenue growth. And the companies selling into all of it are putting up numbers that should be impossible at this scale.

Here’s the provocation: the market is still mispricing several of the best risk/reward setups in the entire AI complex… and one of them isn’t even an AI stock. It’s the anti-AI AI trade.

Below are the five names we covered on this week’s Being Exponential podcast. Click the video below to watch now:

IonQ Inc. (IONQ): The Commercial Quantum Leader

IonQ (IONQ) just delivered $64.7 million in Q1 revenues, up 755% year-over-year, and boosted 2026 guidance to $260 million to $270 million. That’s 102% growth this year — and the forward curve calls for 40% to 45%-plus compounded growth through 2030. With gross margins headed from 43% today toward 70% to 80% over time, this looks like a future Nvidia of quantum computing. The chart confirms the thesis: IONQ reclaimed its 200-day moving average, lost it briefly, and retook it… classic follow-through behavior. I’m a long-term bull.

DoorDash Inc. (DASH): The Anti-AI Trade

Wait, DoorDash (DASH)? Hear me out. The market has punished DoorDash on fears that AI will disintermediate it. I disagree. AI disrupts software-native businesses; DoorDash’s moat is physical… drivers, logistics, vendor relationships across restaurants, grocery, convenience, alcohol, medicine, and retail. Total orders rose 27% year-over-year last quarter, with marketplace gross order volume up 37%. The stock trades at 16 times forward EBITDA — basically a 5-year low — for a high-teens revenue grower with expanding margins. Dirt cheap. The chart hasn’t confirmed the rebound yet, but the valuation is too compelling to sell.

Astera Labs Inc. (ALAB): The AI Toll Collector

Astera Labs’ (ALAB) Q1 revenue grew 14% sequentially and 93% year-over-year, with gross margins of 76.4%. Management projects silicon dollar content rising above $1,000 per XPU within AI racks. As we shift from training to inferencing, complexity increases exponentially… more switches, more retimers, more memory bottlenecks, more opportunities for Astera to sell into. At 57 times forward earnings on 79% growth this year and 42% next year, this is one of the best pick-and-shovel plays in the entire AI infrastructure trade.

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD): The Catch-Up Trade That Caught Up

Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) has been on a tear, and I’d wait for a 20% to 25% pullback toward the $300 to $350 range before adding. But the long-term setup is exceptional: 42% revenue growth this year, accelerating to 51% next year. Nobody else in the AI complex is accelerating. The GPU story is real, but the CPU story — controlling the inferencing layer — is the bigger one.

Reddit Inc. (RDDT): The Humanpowered AI Data Goldmine

Reddit (RDDT) is the exception to my “I hate software stocks” rule. Its unique trove of human-generated content is becoming critical training data for the world’s best LLMs. The advertising business is doing well, but the AI data licensing deals will be the long-run kahuna. Chart is basing; ready for an upside breakout.

For my full breakdown on each name — including the technical setups, margin trajectories, and the exact valuation multiples that make these setups so attractive — watch the full episode of Being Exponential on YouTube or wherever you get your podcasts. Also, be sure to subscribe to Being Exponential on X (formerly Twitter) for more exclusive content.

The Gold Rush is on. Make sure you own the right picks and shovels.