The latest rumours and moods around artificial intelligence (AI) have the potential to shape the entire market.
AI companies now dominate the S&P 500. They are frequently among the top stocks for DIY investors, and most of the top-performing investment trusts of the first half of 2026 had some kind of link to AI.
This means that when confidence in AI is high, the whole market tends to perform well – but the inverse is also true.
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“Concerns are still bubbling about stretched valuations and the risks of an AI bubble bursting, which would affect wealth perceptions around the world, given how much capital is tied up in the promises of the artificial intelligence revolution,” said Susannah Streeter, chief investment strategist at wealth manager Wealth Club.
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This is also a transitional period for AI.
“The first phase of the AI boom has rewarded the companies supplying the technology and materials to build the infrastructure – semiconductor manufacturers, chip designers [and] energy suppliers,” said John Wyn-Evans, head of market analysis at wealth manager Rathbones. “The next phase will evolve into identifying the businesses that can use AI to boost productivity, improve services and deliver stronger earnings growth.”
Wyn-Evans cautioned that as this rotation plays out, investors are more concerned than ever about the potential profitability of AI companies.
Picking individual stocks is challenging, even for the professionals. If you’re looking to invest in AI, you might prefer to spread your risk using an AI ETF.
But if you like to follow individual stocks, here are three that currently occupy an interesting spot in the AI narrative and could be positioned to benefit from its future tailwinds.
Micron Technology
Outside the world of tech specialists, Micron (NASDAQ:MU) has gone from relative obscurity to household name status over the past year.
If you’ve never heard of it, now is the time to address that. Micron is now one of the 20 largest companies in the world by market capitalisation.
It specialises in memory and data storage hardware, which is currently a pinch point for AI and tech hardware more broadly.
Micron is capitalising on this memory supply crunch. Adjusted earnings per share rose by more than 1,200% over the past year according to its latest earnings release.
If that broad story – obscurity to recognition, addressing an AI pinch point and multiplying profits in the process – reminds you of Nvidia during the AI boom, you’re not alone. Micron’s trajectory now is widely being compared to that of Nvidia during the early years of the AI boom.
SpaceX
Don’t let the name fool you. SpaceX (NASDAQ:SPCX) hasn’t rocketed straight into the world’s ten most valuable companies because of its space business.
While rocket launch services and its Starlink satellite network are important revenue drivers in the short term, SpaceX’s valuation is based on the long-term potential the company sees in AI. Of the $28.5 trillion total addressable market outlined in SpaceX’s Initial Public Offering (IPO) prospectus, $26.5 trillion – 93% – is attributed to AI.
According to the prospectus, SpaceX believes its enterprise AI tools “will increasingly support knowledge workers across industries by automating routine cognitive tasks, assisting with research and analysis, generating content and code, and refining decision-making processes”.
There is another reason why SpaceX is a critical business for the future of AI. Its IPO was a success during its opening days, but all eyes are on the stock over the coming months, especially as successive windows for company insiders to cash in on stakes they have held for years open.
SpaceX’s success – or otherwise – over this period could directly impact the appetite of other AI start-ups, most notably Anthropic and OpenAI, to go public themselves. OpenAI in particular appears to be having second thoughts since filing its initial application for an IPO.
SpaceX, though, made a $5 billion loss last year. It is likely to be some time before it generates profits, and in the meantime its share price could well be volatile.
Amazon
What makes Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) an interesting AI stock at present is that it has a strong presence on the infrastructure side, but also looks set to be a major beneficiary as an end user too.
Angeline Ong, senior technical analyst at investing platform IG told MoneyWeek that AI shopping assistant tools like Rufus and Interests could drive greater spend on the company’s core e-commerce business.
“Generative AI is now being used far more strategically to drive conversion, improve retention, and increase basket size, reinforcing an ecosystem that's becoming increasingly stickier and harder for customers to leave,” said Ong.
This is all happening alongside Amazon Web Services (AWS), which is the leading cloud computing service (with 28% market share in Q1 according to data from Synergy Research Group).
“AWS AI revenue is now running at an annualised rate of more than $15 billion, while total AWS revenue climbed 28% year-on-year to approximately $37.6 billion last quarter,” said Ong, adding that much of this growth was driven by AI.
