Was Jim Cramer Right About Costco (COST)?

We recently published a list of Did Jim Cramer Hit or Miss On These 13 Stock Predictions? In this article, we are going to take a look at where Costco Wholesale Corporation (NASDAQ:COST) stands against other stocks that Jim Cramer discussed during the episode of Mad Money on May 1^st, 2024.

During the Mad Money episode which aired on Tuesday, Jim Cramer discussed how stock ownership is viewed in the United States, saying:

“Alright, look, lately, we can’t go a day without hearing some widespread misperceptions about stock ownership. I gotta tell you, I think it’s infuriating. Here we are celebrating the 20th anniversary of Mad Money, dedicated to the proposition that you can potentially make lots of money by picking individual stocks, yet I keep hearing that most Americans don’t care about the stock market, and this direction means nothing.”

READ ALSO:  How Did Jim Cramer’s 12 Bold Predictions Play Out? and Did Jim Cramer Nail All These 9 Stock Predictions?

Jim Cramer challenged the idea that the stock market only serves the wealthy, calling it a flawed and dismissive perspective that overlooks the financial involvement of millions of ordinary Americans, saying:

“It’s the whole reason anyone watches the darn show, and it generally matters, not just to the rich, but to tens of millions of regular people, home gamers, and never let any politician tell you otherwise. […] More than 60% of Americans have some exposure to the market, either directly or indirectly. 70 million people have active 401Ks. Millions more have retired with them. 60 million people have IRAs. Only 156 million people voted in November. I mean, we’re talking half the electorate here.”

Cramer argued that stockholders make up a major segment of the population and should not be ignored. He stated, “It’s not just arrogant, rich people who own stocks.” He also criticized affluent individuals who caution others against investing in stocks while continuing to benefit from their tax advantages. As he put it:

“Now look, stocks are ridiculously tax advantaged, more than just rich people want that. In a world where probably no more than 10% of this country can retire on their paycheck savings, stocks represent a different kind of social security, a one-sided pack where people try to save and the government dismisses them.”

Methodology

For this article, we compiled a list of 13 stocks that were discussed by Jim Cramer during the episode of Mad Money on May 1^st, 2024. We then calculated their performance from May 1^st, 2024, market close to April 30^th, 2025, market close. We have also included the hedge fund sentiment for the stocks, which we sourced from Insider Monkey’s Q4 2024 database of over 900 hedge funds. The stocks are listed in the order that Cramer mentioned them.

Please note that this article mentions Jim Cramer’s previous opinions and may not account for any changes to his opinions regarding the stocks that are mentioned. It is primarily an examination of how his previously provided opinions have panned out.

Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 373.4% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 218 percentage points (see more details here).

Costco Wholesale Corporation (NASDAQ:COST)

Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 96

When a caller brought up Costco Wholesale Corporation (NASDAQ:COST), the retail giant was praised for its stability and ‘basing’ pattern despite leadership changes. Here’s what Jim Cramer said at the time:

“I like Costco very much. What’s happened is we got a new CEO, we got a new CFO, and there always going to be people say well, you know what, the stock paid the dividend it’s over. I think this stock is basing. That’s what the stock is doing, it’s basing—and that makes me like it.”

Cramer was rightly bullish on the retailer, and its stock is now up by 38.35% since those comments.

In a recent episode, Cramer also gave his view on how Costco Wholesale Corp (NASDAQ:COST) will benefit from Trump’s tariff regime. Here’s what he said:

“Costco huge winner. Why? Because they have a club. The club status is to pass on anything. And then they still have the, and it’s still going to be cheaper. So we cannot lump all these together. We lump them initially. Costco is going to be down as much as Target, but then we have to come back and say maybe Target should stay down, but Costco should go up. So there’s like a secondary look at things.”

Overall, COST ranks 5th on our list of stocks that Jim Cramer discussed during the episode of Mad Money on May 1^st, 2024. While we acknowledge the potential of COST as an investment, our conviction lies in the belief that some AI stocks hold greater promise for delivering higher returns and doing so within a shorter time frame. There is an AI stock that went up since the beginning of 2025, while popular AI stocks lost around 25%. If you are looking for an AI stock that is more promising than COST but that trades at less than 5 times its earnings, check out our report about this cheapest AI stock.

READ NEXT: 20 Best AI Stocks To Buy Now and 30 Best Stocks to Buy Now According to Billionaires.

Disclosure: None. This article is originally published at Insider Monkey.