3 growth stocks I’ve bought for the ‘AI agent’ revolution

Edward Sheldon sees AI agents as one of the most exciting themes in the stock market. Here are three growth stocks he has bought in an effort to capitalise.

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As a long-term investor, I tend to focus on big, powerful investment themes. And one theme I’m really excited about today is the emergence of ‘AI agents’ – software that can perform business tasks autonomously. I believe the investment potential here is enormous. With that in mind, here are three growth stocks I’ve bought for the agentic AI revolution.

Salesforce

My number one play on AI agents today is software company Salesforce (NYSE: CRM). It has a product called Agentforce and it’s having a lot of success with it.

Indeed, since its launch in October last year, the company has signed over 8,000 customers. Of these, around half are now paying for the service.

The main reason I’m bullish here is that Agentforce integrates really well with Salesforce’s apps and data services (Data Cloud and Tableau Next). This is important – without the right data, agents are likely to be useless.

I’ll point out that ServiceNow’s agentic AI offering also integrates well with data and apps. So, competition from this firm is a risk.

However, I like the risk-reward proposition here at today’s share price and valuation. Salesforce trades on a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of just 23. I believe the stock offers value at present and is worth considering.

Microsoft

Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) is well known for its generative AI capabilities (it’s a part-owner of ChatGPT-owner OpenAI). What a lot of investors don’t realise, however, is that this company is also a major player in the agentic AI space.

Today, it offers a range of services designed to help developers/organisations build and deploy agents to increase business productivity. For example, Azure AI Foundry Agent Service allows professional developers to build specialised agents to handle complex business tasks.

I was buying this growth stock a few months ago when it was near $350. It’s now at $480, so doesn’t look as attractive as it did back then.

That said, I think it’s still worth considering for the long term (especially on a 5%-10% pullback). While competition from other cloud computing giants such as Amazon and Alphabet is a risk, I believe this stock has bags of potential.

CrowdStrike

Finally, I think CrowdStrike (NASDAQ: CRWD) could be a major player in the agentic AI revolution. It’s one of the world’s leading cybersecurity companies.

It offers a solution called Charlotte AI, which CEO George Kurtz refers to as the company’s agentic security analyst. This is designed to transform threat detection and response by bringing automation and autonomous reasoning to cybersecurity operations.

CrowdStrike should also benefit from other companies’ rollout of AI agents. Given that they typically have access to massive amounts of data, they are going to significantly increase the surface area of IT that needs to be protected.

Now, this stock is the riskiest of the three. That’s because it’s a much younger company (meaning it’s a little more unproven) and doesn’t have a lot of profits at this stage.

It has also had a huge run this year, rising over 40%. I still believe it’s worth considering, but I think investors are better off waiting for a pullback before buying.

Should you invest, the value of your investment may rise or fall and your capital is at risk. Before investing, your individual circumstances should be assessed. Consider taking independent financial advice.

Edward Sheldon has positions in Alphabet, Amazon, CrowdStrike, Microsoft, and Salesforce. The Motley Fool UK has recommended Alphabet, Amazon, CrowdStrike, Microsoft, ServiceNow, and Salesforce. Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool’s board of directors. Views expressed on the companies mentioned in this article are those of the writer and therefore may differ from the official recommendations we make in our subscription services such as Share Advisor, Hidden Winners and Pro. Here at The Motley Fool we believe that considering a diverse range of insights makes us better investors.

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