Marvell (NASDAQ:MRVL | MRVL Price Prediction) stock is back on the radar for growth investors after spending the past six months chopping around in both directions. Undoubtedly, the tech sector has been lacking direction of late, and while the Nasdaq 100 and S&P 500 have more recently rolled over, Marvell stock found a way to break out to hit new 52-week highs.
New all-time heights could be next as investors consider the road ahead and the big vote of confidence given by none other than Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA), which invested $2 billion in the firm. Indeed, anything that Nvidia seems to touch or invest in seems to turn into gold for traders. The big question is whether it’s also a sign that there’s long-term value in play.
Marvell might be Nvidia’s most interesting bet yet
Criticize the too-frequent, too-circular deals made by Jensen Huang and his firm, but the market has spoken, and it’s rewarding the shares of companies that have received investment dollars from the GPU giant. Until that changes or until some sort of AI bubble bursts, I think following Nvidia into other AI opportunities in the space could be an intriguing move. After all, few folks know AI, chips, and data centers better than Jensen Huang.
The big worry, though, is whether the man is paying as much attention to valuation as to the story to be had. And the answer, at least in my very humble opinion, is that he is weighing the price of admission with the longer-term growth opportunities to be had. Indeed, Jensen Huang seems to be playing the long-term game.
And that makes the names Nvidia bets on less of a timely trade, and perhaps more of a stock that’s deserving of a very long-term spot (think five years or more) at the core of one’s growth portfolio. So, in short, a name like Marvell, which is Nvidia’s most recent investment, at least as of this writing, could go either way in the near-term.
Marvell’s long-term growth drivers may still be underrated by the market, even after the Nvidia-driven bump
In the long run, though, there may very well be unrecognized potential, especially at a somewhat modest, though certainly not dirt-cheap 27.7 times forward price-to-earnings (P/E). That’s not at all an obscene multiple to pay for a company that’s one of the stealthier names behind the curtain of the AI data center boom. What’s more, though, is that XPUs (custom chips) might be made even more powerful under the Nvidia umbrella.
Add the optical connectivity solutions (switches and digital signal processors) into the equation, and Marvell stands out as a name that offers a very powerful one-two punch as investors gravitate towards more-efficient custom silicon chips meant for inference as well as next-generation connectivity within the AI data center itself.
Whether it’s another horse to bet on in the custom silicon race or a cheaper play on optical connectivity (especially relative to some of the other plays that Nvidia also bet $2 billion on), I think it’s becoming harder for investors to count Marvell out of the game, especially given its XPUs now play very nicely with Nvidia’s NVLink Fusion platform. In my view, it’s nice to step into the Nvidia ecosystem as a partner, given the doors it might open to greater growth.
The road ahead looks bright
Looking ahead, it will be interesting to see how much incremental revenue Marvell’s XPUs can generate now that it’s teamed up with Nvidia. Add the sheer momentum behind the interconnect segment, as well as other projects with the hyperscalers, and I’m inclined to think that Nvidia may have picked up the Marvell stake at a stunning discount, one that might still exist for investors looking to get in at just north of $105 per share.
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