Artificial intelligence (AI) is difficult to escape these days, both in our everyday lives and on the stock market. While AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Gemini are becoming increasingly integrated into our work and home lives, every company is seemingly investing in an AI future.
So it's no wonder that many investors are making AI stocks a centrepiece of their investing portfolios. I am one of those investors. But not purposefully.
As it happens, some of my largest portfolio holdings, ones that I have held for many years, have morphed into some of the leaders in AI technology and infrastructure.
Without realising it, I've become an 'AI investor'.
That suits me just fine. I don't claim to be even close to an expert in AI technology, and by extension, its implications for investing. But what I do know is that it will shape the future of our economy and the successes of the world's best businesses. As such, it is a trend that I want to be invested in.
Apple Inc (NASDAQ: AAPL), Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ: GOOG)(NASDAQ: GOOGL), Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ: AMZN), and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) are the portfolio holdings that give me the best exposure to AI.
As mentioned above, I have owned these stocks for a long time. When I bought each of them, I did not anticipate their emerging status as AI leaders. It was Apple's sticky product ecosystem, Google's dominance of search, Amazon's ever-expanding presence in Australia (not to mention its AWS division), and Microsoft's Office and Xbox brands that initially attracted me to each of these companies' shares.
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How I'm betting big on AI with my ASX share portfolio
I have held on, and occasionally added to, each of these positions ever since my first purchases. Over this period, it's been a delight to watch each of these companies push the frontier of AI technology.
Microsoft, through its early backing of ChatGPT owner OpenAI and its own emerging Copilot platform, is now an influential AI player. Ditto with Alphabet's Gemini. Apple's own AI products have been a little more concerning, but when Apple Intelligence eventually comes into its own, I think it has a lot of potential as well. And Amazon's AWS will almost certainly continue to play a huge role in providing the AI infrastructure that the technology will increasingly rely upon.
In addition to these AI players, one of my portfolio's largest positions is in the Schwab US Large-Cap Growth ETF (NYSEMKT: SCHG). This exchange-traded fund (ETF) focuses on holding America's most exciting technology companies, many of which are also investing heavily in AI.
So, even without an explicit focus on AI stocks, my portfolio has naturally evolved into a bet on an AI future. That's just fine with me, and I'm excited to see what comes of it.
