We Asked Hundreds of Millennial Investors Which FAANG Stock They'd Own If They Could Pick Only One, and Virtually None Said Facebook or Netflix Markets Insider asked hundreds of millennial investors which FAANG stock they'd buy if they could choose only one, and virtually none said Facebook or Netflix.
This story originally appeared on Business Insider
Out of 322 panel respondents, only nine said they'd choose Netflix ahead of its mega-cap tech brethren Facebook, Apple, Amazon, and Google/Alphabet. That's not 9 percent, that was literally just nine out of 322 people. Facebook fared even worse, drawing just seven selections.
On the other side of the spectrum was Amazon, the runaway top choice, with 164 affirmative responses. Alphabet was the second-most-popular choice, with 99 votes. Apple occupied the middle ground, with 43 respondents selecting it.
The participants are enrolled in Markets Insider's panel of more than 3,000 millennial investors, which is not to be taken as a poll or survey. To qualify, the respondents had to be millennial-aged and holding an active brokerage account, such as one with a financial-services provider like Robinhood or Fidelity. The panel participants were asked about their views on the FAANG stocks in mid-August.
Here's a rundown of recent developments for the companies in question, which could help to contextualize the opinions held by our millennial panel.
Netflix: Streaming competition is cranking up
Netflix has seen several popular shows pulled from its platform as companies such as Comcast and Disney prepare to release their own streaming services.
That competition has manifested itself in subscriber shrinkage. Shares of Netflix plunged in July after the company reported its first quarterly decline in US subscribers since 2011. The miss brought into focus the company's ability to not only add new users, but maintain customers with its content offerings.
Netflix's stock also took a hit in September after Apple said its streaming platform would cost $5 a month. The figure was much lower than expected and cheaper than any of Netflix's offerings.
Shares of Netflix are up just 3 percent year-to-date, lagging behind the S&P 500's gain of roughly 20 percent.
Facebook: Antitrust regulators are circling
Over the past several years, Facebook has come under immense scrutiny over how it collects and harnesses consumer data, as well as whether it has prevented competition through its acquisitions.
Shares of Facebook tumbled in September after New York Attorney General Letitia James said her office was coordinating a multistate antitrust investigation into the company.
The announcement came on the back of Facebook's $5 billion settlement with the Federal Trade Commission over its handling of consumer data in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal.
The investigation, involving eight states and Washington, DC, is expected to focus on Facebook's data practices and whether the company stifled competition through acquisitions.
Despite the rising antitrust pressure, shares of Facebook are up more than 40 percent year-to-date.
Amazon: Next-day shipping is the next growth frontier
Amazon pushed the entire retail industry to shrink delivery times for e-commerce orders with its two-day Prime shipping program. Now, analysts see its next-day shipping as a huge catalyst for revenue growth.
The RBC Capital Markets analyst Mike Mahaney said the initiative could create as much as $24 billion in revenue for the e-commerce giant.
Amazon began offering next-day shipping in June after saying in April that it planned to spend $800 million to shave a day off its Prime two-day-shipping guarantee.
Mahaney said the company was likely making one-day shipping a priority because customers are expecting accelerating delivery options and greater convenience.
Amazon's stock price is up more than 20 percent year-to-date.
Alphabet/Google: Cloud business is booming
Alphabet's stock gained as much as 12 percent following its second-quarter earnings, where the company showed significant growth in its cloud business.
The company's annual revenue run rate for its cloud business grew to $8 billion during the period. Ruth Porat, Alphabet's senior vice president and chief financial officer, said on an earnings call that the Google Cloud Platform "remains one of the fastest-growing businesses in Alphabet."
On the other hand, Google is also facing an investigation by 50 state attorneys general into potential anticompetitive practices in its ad business.
Shares of Alphabet are up roughly 19 percent year-to-date.
