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The Smartest Stocks to Buy With $1,000 in May

www.nasdaq.com · May 6, 2026 · 19:05

Written by Geoffrey Seiler for The Motley Fool->

Amazon has a plethora of growth opportunities in front of it.

Apple has one of the best business models on the planet.

You don't need to turn over a bunch of rocks trying to find the next big stock no one has ever heard of before. In fact, often, sticking to tried-and-true leaders can be the best way to go.

If you have $1,000 to buy some stocks this month, two you can buy right now are Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) and Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL). Both are market leaders with great business models that have a long runway of growth still in front of them.

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Let's look at why both are great buys now. With a little over $1,000, you can buy two shares of each.

Amazon's stock has awoken from its slumber, and it's time to jump on board. The company has multiple growth drivers that are just starting to bear fruit, which should help power its stock higher in the coming years.

On the e-commerce side of its business, Amazon has been seeing great operating leverage due to its investments in robotics and artificial intelligence (AI). The company is the largest manufacturer and operator of robots in the world, which just makes it much more efficient. This is helping improve margins and driving profitability.

Amazon then shocked the world earlier this month when it announced that it was opening up its logistics network for all businesses. Customers will be able to use its services across all their sales channels, and it has already signed up major players in the consumer goods, retail, and industrial industries as clients. This also isn't just business-to-consumer shipping but will also include high-margin, predictable business-to-business shipments as well.

At the same time, Amazon's cloud computing business continues to have a huge opportunity in front of it. The company is the largest cloud provider in the world, and it's aggressively building out its data infrastructure to keep up with demand for AI computing power and services. Its chip business provides it with a cost advantage, which gives it more bang for its buck with capital expenditures and helps reduce inference costs.

Meanwhile, the company looks well positioned for the rise of agentic AI through both its own custom central processing units (CPUs) as well as through its deal with OpenAI centered on AI agents. Expect growth to continue to accelerate for AWS.

With its pending acquisition of Globalstar, Amazon is looking to satellite internet to become another big growth driver. It also has one of the world's largest digital ad platforms with its sponsored ad business, which is growing quickly, and it is testing out an AI and robotics-powered supercenter that could challenge Walmart in the bricks-and-mortar space.

The future looks bright for Amazon, and the stock is a great one to buy right now.

Apple has one of the greatest business models ever created. While best known for the iPhone and its other devices, the real beauty of its model is that these devices essentially lock consumers into a high-margin services and payments ecosystem.

The company has created a high-end electronics brand that sees customers replace their devices every three to five years. Meanwhile, once customers buy an Apple product, it's difficult to move to another brand without losing things like photos, music, and app purchases, which makes the business very sticky. Apple also tends to attract a more affluent customer base, and its Apple Pay system has become a huge, high-margin moneymaker, as it takes a small cut on every transaction.

Apple is currently seeing a resurgence in iPhone sales, and the company is in a great spot even as current CEO Tim Cook prepares to step down. Meanwhile, this is an exciting time, as this will give Apple's new CEO, John Ternus, a real opportunity to look and innovate and put his stamp on the company. This makes this a good time to buy the stock.

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*Stock Advisor returns as of May 6, 2026.

Geoffrey Seiler has positions in Amazon. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Apple, and Walmart. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

The views and opinions expressed herein are the views and opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of Nasdaq, Inc.

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