The Nasdaq Just Hit Correction Territory: The 2 Smartest Stocks to Buy and Hold Forever

With the Nasdaq Composite (NASDAQINDEX: ^IXIC) moving into correction territory (down at least 10% from an all-time high), several of its constituent stocks are suddenly a lot more attractively priced than they were to start the year. While investors never like to see markets pull back into correction territory, it does present a great buying opportunity for some great companies caught up in the sell-off.

Let's look at two quality stocks you can buy on this market dip and hold forever.

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1. Alphabet

With the market pullback, Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOGL) (NASDAQ: GOOG) finds its shares down about 20% (as of this writing) from its all-time highs set in early February. The dip in price brings its stock down to a very attractive valuation of a forward price-to-earnings ratio (P/E) of 18.5. That's not expensive for a company with the set of businesses that Alphabet owns.

While best known for its search business Google, Alphabet is actually a whole lot more. It is the world's leading digital advertising company, where it connects advertisers with consumers through both its own properties as well as third-party sites. Google is the largest digital advertising platform in the world, while its YouTube platform is the world's fourth-largest. In between are Meta Platforms' social media apps, such as Facebook and Instagram, and Amazon, which serves up sponsored ads for third-party products sold on its site.

Alphabet is betting heavily on artificial intelligence (AI), which it is using to improve its search results and to create AI Overviews to quickly give users answers to their questions. Historically, the company has only served ads on about 20% of its search queries, so its AI Overviews are a strong potential source of growth as eventually, it should be able to monetize them through new ad formats. The company has a huge network of advertisers and search history, so all the ingredients are there to profit from AI Overviews.

At the same time, the company's newest Gemini 2.0 model is improving and catching up to the competition. It has its own Gemini app, while Gemini is also being incorporated throughout Alphabet's businesses. This is helping the company become a leader in multimodal search (such as visual search), while its Veo 2 text-to-image video generator has risen above the competition.

Alphabet also owns the third-largest cloud computing business with Google Cloud, which is helping customers build out their own AI models and applications. The unit grew revenue by 30% last quarter and segment income by 142%. The unit has seen a profitability inflection point now that it has reached sufficient scale. The company has also developed its own custom AI chip with the help of Broadcom, which it says is leading to faster inference times and lower costs. This should help the business continue to see margin improvements.

Alphabet is also a leader in two emerging technologies: quantum computing and autonomous driving. Its Willow chip recently made a big breakthrough in solving an issue that has hampered quantum computing, while its Waymo unit is the only company offering paid robotaxi rides in the U.S.

Take this all together, and Alphabet is a great buy at current levels.

Image source: Getty Images.

2. Microsoft

Like Alphabet, while Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) is known for its software Office 365 productivity tools, such as Word, Excel, and PowerPoint, it is also a whole lot more. It owns the second-largest cloud computing business in the world and the Windows PC operating system. In addition, it operates the professional development website LinkedIn, software development platform GitHub, AI voice platform Nuance, and the Xbox video gaming platform as well as video game studios such as Activision Blizzard, among other businesses.

Microsoft has proven to be adaptable over the years, driving growth by transitioning from a traditional software licensing model to offering its productivity software programs through its Office 365 subscription model. More recently, the company has been one of the early leaders in AI through a large investment and partnership in OpenAI.

The biggest beneficiary of its embrace of AI has been its cloud computing unit, Azure, which grew its revenue by 31% last quarter. Similar to Google Cloud, customers are flocking to Azure to help them build out their own AI models and applications. Last quarter, Azure AI revenue soared 157% year over year. Meanwhile, it said this is leading to robust adoption of its SQL Hyperscale and Cosmos DB solutions.

Microsoft's biggest AI opportunity, however, may lie in its Microsoft 365 AI copilots, which are AI assistants that help users save time and more easily complete tasks. Copilots can do such things as prioritize Outlook email messages, summarize a Word document, or help draft a PowerPoint presentation through natural language. They have also started to be able to help with more complex tasks, such as being able to use the Python programming language in Excel using only natural language prompts.

At the cost of $30 per enterprise user per month, on top of the Microsoft 365 subscription, this is a big potential growth opportunity for Microsoft. If these Copilots can prove to save time and money, they will eventually see high levels of adoption.

Following the market's pullback, the stock trades at a forward P/E of 25 times based on analyst estimates for fiscal year 2026 (ending in June 2026). That's a reasonable valuation for a leading tech company that has a large recurring nature business and a history of adaptability. As such, this is a great time to look to establish a position in the stock.

Don’t miss this second chance at a potentially lucrative opportunity

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• Nvidia: if you invested $1,000 when we doubled down in 2009, you’d have $292,207!*
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Right now, we’re issuing “Double Down” alerts for three incredible companies, and there may not be another chance like this anytime soon.

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*Stock Advisor returns as of March 10, 2025

John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Randi Zuckerberg, a former director of market development and spokeswoman for Facebook and sister to Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Geoffrey Seiler has positions in Alphabet. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Meta Platforms, and Microsoft. The Motley Fool recommends Broadcom and recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.