Last year, the data analytics market size was valued at $271.83 billion, and the sector’s valuation is expected to soar to $745.15 billion by 2030. Clearly, companies are relying more and more on mining trillions of data points to provide them with valuable insights about their businesses and customers. The information that they obtain, in turn, allows them to make changes that will wind up boosting their top and bottom lines. Consequently, I’m confident that data analytics companies will continue to grow rapidly going forward. Here are the three best data analytics stocks to buy in order to exploit the latter trend.
Oracle (ORCL)
A venerable tech giant, Oracle (NASDAQ:ORCL) provides multiple cloud-oriented database systems and in-database analytical functions. Last year, the company acquired Cerner which sells patient data systems for healthcare organizations. Over the longer term, Oracle’s top-notch sales team and technology should greatly boost Cerner’s top and bottom lines.
On Nov. 13, Edward Jones, upgraded its rating on ORCL stock to buy from hold. The bank believes that Oracle’s major efforts to offer more cloud services, along with its transition to a subscription revenue model, will cause its sales growth to meaningfully accelerate.
Unlike the vast majority of data analytics stocks, ORCL has a low valuation as its forward price-earnings ratio is just 21, slightly below the average P/E ratio of the S&P 500.
Accenture (ACN)
Accenture’s (NYSE:ACN) consultants enable companies to launch new data analytics systems. Among its offerings are AI-driven products and content analytics tools that provide firms with valuable information.
Accenture has doubled down on data and AI, as it decided earlier this year to double the size of its data & AI practice team in the next three years. The company also created a new team to reimagine service delivery using generative AI and other emerging AI capabilities.
Moreover, ACN has partnered with tech giants ServiceNow (NYSE:NOW) and Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) to provide other firms with AI solutions. Of course, two of the major uses of AI are data mining and data analysis.
In light of all of this news, I believe that Accenture has many strong, positive, growth catalysts. And yet, ACCN has a fairly low forward price-earnings ratio of 27.
Alteryx (AYX)
Alteryx’s (NYSE:AYX) tools enable firms to combine and comprehensively analyze data from many sources. One positive, differentiating attribute of Alteryx is the high level of automation of its offerings which save its customers a great deal of time and money. Another of the firm’s strengths is its very high gross margins which routinely come in at around 90%.
Last quarter, the company’s annualized recurring revenue jumped 21% versus the same period a year earlier to $940 million, showing that its subscription base is growing very quickly. Also noteworthy is that its Q3 net income, excluding certain items, came in at $20 million in Q3, up from an adjusted loss of $3 million in Q3 of 2022.
Compared to other data analysis stocks of its size, AYX has a relatively low forward price-earnings ratio of 30. I believe that the company could easily become a takeover target, following in the footsteps of Splunk (NASDAQ:SPLK) and a number of other small-and-medium data-analysis firms.
On the date of publication, Larry Ramer’s wife held a long position in NOW. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.
