The Best Stocks to Invest $1,000 in Right Now

Key Points

• Walmart’s disappointing second-quarter profit doesn’t change the fact that it’s still tightening relationships with consumers by casting a wider, all-encompassing net.

• Rocket Lab brings something to the table that the space-launch business has needed for a while: cost-effectiveness.

• Power-efficient computer processors matter now more than ever. Arm Holdings is ready to deliver.

• 10 stocks we like better than Walmart ›

Got some cash you're ready to put to work? It's easier said than done right now. Too many trades feel a little too crowded, and too many stocks feel too overpriced.

If you're willing to consider some names other than the market's most popular picks, however, you're apt to find something you like.

Where to invest $1,000 right now? Our analyst team just revealed what they believe are the 10 best stocks to buy right now. Learn More »

With that as the backdrop, here's a rundown of three of the very best stocks to invest $1,000 in at this time. Note that each one is very different from either of the other two. That's the point. These three picks are very complementary to one another. Combined, they make a nice balanced package of risk and reward.

Image source: Getty Images.

1. Walmart

Yes, Walmart (NYSE: WMT) shares slumped in response to the retailer's fiscal second quarter results. Namely, the stock ultimately fell more than 6% after reporting earnings of $0.68 per share versus analyst estimates of $0.76. The company cited tariffs as the chief cause for the setback.

There's a reason, however, that Walmart's stock has managed to recoup almost all of its post-earnings pullback. After having had some time to think about it, investors recognize that its top-line growth of 4.8% (up 5.6% on a constant-currency basis) to reported revenue of $177.4 billion still beat estimates of $176.2 billion, and the company still raised its full-year sales and earnings growth outlook.

Perhaps the most compelling reason to step into a stake in Walmart while the stock's still priced where it was early this year, however, is how and where it's doing well that isn't yet fully showing up on its top and bottom lines.

Case in point: Last quarter's advertising revenue generated via Walmart.com and through its Vizio smart-television platform was up 46% year over year, and 31% higher in the all-important U.S. market. The company doesn't disclose specific quarterly numbers, but for perspective, it did say its worldwide ad business reached $4.4 billion last fiscal year. That's less than 1% of its total sales, but this is high-margin revenue for what's usually a low-margin business.

More important to current and would-be shareholders, it demonstrates that Walmart now fully understands the modern-day business model is building a large consumerism ecosystem that leverages powerful brand name and sheer reach in a wide range of ways.

In this same vein, Walmart's worldwide e-commerce revenue grew another 25% year over year in Q2, led by in-store fulfillment and local pickup/delivery. Again, this illustrates the retailer's capacity to meld its online and offline offerings into a lifestyle kind of enterprise, as does the 15.3% improvement in Walmart+ membership income.

Simply put, Walmart is becoming an all-encompassing, go-to lifestyle solution for consumers, and a recurring-revenue machine for shareholders -- even if most customers and investors don't realize it just yet.

2. Rocket Lab

While you've certainly heard of Walmart, there's a good chance you've never heard of Rocket Lab (NASDAQ: RKLB). There's also a decent chance, however, you somehow ultimately benefit from the service it provides.

Just as the name suggests, Rocket Lab puts satellites into orbit. Not the big ones (at least not yet). Rather, Rocket Lab's specialty is cost-effective launches of relatively small satellites. Its reusable small-lift rocket called the Electron can carry up to 660 pounds into low-Earth orbit. To date, 70 successful launches of Electron have allowed for the deployment of a total of 238 satellites.

And this sort of solution is a huge part of the space industry's future.

See, while Electron can't lift the heavy or even medium-sized payloads that will put man back on the moon, that's only a fraction of the current and future need. As communication satellites shrink in size and weight at the same time demand for satellite-supported broadband and mobile telephony connections soar, a cost-effective launch solution like Electron -- with an average per-launch cost in the ballpark of $7 million to $8 million -- is exactly what telecom companies, as well as the military, are looking for. That's a key reason Global Markets Insights believes the worldwide small-launch vehicle market is set to grow at an average annualized pace of more than 12% through 2034.

That said, there's a huge potential catalyst brewing here. While the world will need such a launch service far less frequently, Rocket Lab is working on a medium-lift rocket called Neutron that can launch up to 14 tons worth of cargo and supplies, which will be necessary to support missions to the moon, or even other planets.

And it's close. Although there's no firm date yet, the company says it's going to launch its first Neutron rocket before the end of the year. The Virginia launch pad that will be used for this flight was officially unveiled late last month.

Interested investors will just want to brace for volatility. Not only is this fairly small company's (a market cap of only about $20 billion) stock easily bumped around by headlines, its current lack of profitability only adds to its ticker's unpredictability. If you can stomach it, though, Rocket Lab is arguably worth it.

3. Arm Holdings

Finally, add Arm Holdings (NASDAQ: ARM) to your list of great stocks to buy if you've got $1,000 -- or any other amount of money -- you're looking to put to work now.

It's not exactly a household name. Like Rocket Lab, though, there's a pretty good chance you or someone living in your household regularly depends on its product.

In short, Arm designs computer processors. And to be clear, it only designs them. Whereas familiar technology companies like Nvidia or Intel outsource the production of their own branded silicon to third-party manufacturers like Taiwan Semiconductor, Arm Holdings licenses its know-how to players like Nvidia and Intel. There's not a great deal of revenue to be generated with this business model; Arm only did about $4 billion in sales last year. This is high-margin revenue, though, and consistently so.

But what makes Arm's tech so special to companies that clearly have plenty of their own experience in the semiconductor race? In a word, efficiency -- Arm's processing architecture consumes considerably less electricity than rival chips designed by Intel or Advanced Micro Devices.

Amazon Web Services' Arm-based Graviton cloud computing processor, for instance, is about 60% more power-efficient than other comparable processors, resulting in 20% less cost to use them. Apple also opted for Arm-designed processors in its newest iPhones, capable of performing power-hungry artificial intelligence (AI) work from the device itself. Without Arm's know-how, heavy use of the iPhone's AI capabilities would quickly drain the device's battery.

Perhaps the place where Arm Holdings is going to make the biggest net impact, however, is in the data center market that currently consumes jaw-dropping amounts of electricity. And the market is noticing. Leveraging its newest architecture, early last year, Google unveiled its first-ever Arm-based CPU -- called Axion -- for use by its cloud computing customers.

Given this, it should come as no surprise that Arm expects its share of the data center processor market to swell from last year's 15% to 50% by the end of this year. This would still just be the beginning of a major growth run, though. The analyst community believes Arm's top line is set to grow by more than 20% per year for at least the next three years, leading to a near-tripling in profits during this stretch, and justifying what seems like a steep valuation right now.

Should you invest $1,000 in Walmart right now?

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James Brumley has positions in Alphabet. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Advanced Micro Devices, Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Intel, Nvidia, Rocket Lab, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing, and Walmart. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: short August 2025 $24 calls on Intel and short November 2025 $21 puts on Intel. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.