Billionaire Philipe Laffont Just Sold Coatue Management's Stake in Super Micro Computer and Piled Into Another Artificial Intelligence (AI) Giant Up Over 336,000% Since Its IPO

Key Points

• Billionaire Philippe Laffont founded Coatue Management in 1999.

• The company's stock portfolio was valued at roughly $35 billion at the end of the second quarter.

• Few know how to spot emerging tech trends better than Laffont.

• 10 stocks we like better than Oracle ›

In the 1990s, an elite group of investors worked for a tech-focused hedge fund called Tiger Management, led by the legendary investor Julian Robertson. Not only did Robertson mentor this group of investors, but he would go on to seed many of their future hedge funds as the talented group, referred to as the Tiger Cubs, went on to become great investors in their own right.

Philippe Laffont, the founder of Coatue Management, is part of this group, and is now viewed as one of the great tech investors of the modern era. Coatue Management's equity holdings were valued at roughly $35 billion at the end of the second quarter. That's why investors are always paying attention to which stocks Coatue is buying and selling.

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In the second quarter, the fund sold its stake in Super Micro Computer (NASDAQ: SMCI) and piled into another artificial intelligence (AI) giant that generated a total return over 336,000% since its initial public offering.

Image source: Getty Images.

Super Micro Computer: Beating the shorts so far

AI and tech infrastructure and server maker Super Micro Computer has been a controversial and volatile play for the past year. In August 2024, short-seller Hindenburg Research came out with a major short report alleging potential accounting fraud at the company. The report said that Supermicro rehired executives who had been a part of an accounting scandal at the company in 2018 that involved understating expenses and overstating revenue.

The stock got hit hard after Supermicro announced it would need to delay its annual 2024 filing to assess its internal controls. However, the company would eventually go on to file its 2024 10-K and did not need to restate any of its financial statements, a good sign for investors. Furthermore, management earlier this year also provided strong fiscal 2026 guidance of $40 billion in revenue, way ahead of consensus at the time. Supermicro's fiscal year ends on June 30 of each year.

In August, shares struggled after the company reported lower-than-expected quarterly results and weaker-than-expected guidance, due to President Donald Trump's tariffs, which resulted in less working capital in June and "specification changes from a major new customer." Laffont and Coatue loaded up on the stock some time in the fourth quarter of 2024 and sold in the second quarter of this year, so the fund could have bought the dip after the short report and might have sold over concerns about tariffs, although that's speculation. Supermicro's stock is up about 46% this year, so Coatue seems to have timed its trade well.

Supermicro looks real cheap right now for a stock benefiting from the AI boom, trading around 16 times forward earnings. Tariffs are likely to be an ongoing issue but if AI demand remains strong, Supermicro, which supplies servers to the likes of Nvidia, should be a major beneficiary. The stock may remain volatile, but I think investors can take a position in the more speculative part of their portfolio.

Oracle: A longtime tech player benefiting from AI

With a market cap of nearly $664 billion, Oracle (NYSE: ORCL) isn't part of the "Magnificent Seven," but it's another large tech company expected to benefit from the AI capital expenditure boom. Coatue purchased over 3.8 million shares in the second quarter, valued at over $843 million.

The cloud giant offers clients the ability to tap into a number of AI solutions including generative AI and machine learning capabilities that provide automation tools and AI application development, among other services. Similar to Microsoft and Amazon, although not as dominant, Oracle's position as a cloud provider positions the company well to be a first point of contact for clients looking to add AI capabilities.

In the company's most recent earnings report for its fourth quarter of fiscal 2025, which ended May 31, Oracle reported results ahead of Wall Street estimates and said that cloud infrastructure revenue sales should increase 70% in fiscal year 2026, after generating 52% growth in fiscal 2025.

Oracle CEO Larry Ellison said the company is particularly well positioned because it has a strong data advantage and has developed one of the most comprehensive databases in the world. "Our applications take all of your application data and make that data available to the most popular AI models," he said on Oracle's earnings call for the company's fiscal fourth quarter of 2025.

If you like ChatGPT, you use ChatGPT. If you like Grok, you use Grok. You use that in the Oracle Cloud. We are the key enabler for enterprises to use their own data and models. No one else is doing that.

Having gone public in 1986, Oracle has been a major tech disruptor for decades. The stock is up over 336,000% since its initial public offering and also up over 41% this year. Trading at 34 times forward earnings, the stock is not necessarily cheap, but given its track record and strong expected growth in cloud infrastructure, Oracle can benefit from AI without being as much in the spotlight as some of the Magnificent Seven names.

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Bram Berkowitz has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Oracle. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.