With all of the major indices making big moves higher in 2024, we were very interested to see what the top prognosticators across Wall Street think will happen in 2025 as we start the second quarter of the new century. Not surprisingly, many of the firms that we cover are very positive going forward, despite some trepidation after the big moves higher.

24/7 Wall St. Key Points:

• For the first time in over 25 years, the S&P 500 posted back-to-back 20% gains
• January could prove to be a difficult month after no Santa Claus rally
• Goldman Sachs started coverage of some exciting companies in December
• Are you ready for what could be a volatile year? Why not schedule a meeting with a financial advisor in your area for a portfolio review?

Over the last month, as 2024 came to a close, the analysts at Goldman Sachs started covering various new companies in multiple sectors. They posted that list as we kick off 2025 to recapitulate those top new ideas. Four look like great stocks for growth and income investors to review, and all have sizable upside to the Goldman Sachs assigned price target.

Why we recommend Goldman Sachs stocks

Goldman Sachs is the acknowledged leader in the investment landscape on Wall Street and worldwide. The firm’s top-notch research department continues to provide clients with the best ideas across the investing spectrum and is likely to continue for years.

The Cheesecake Factory

Yielding a solid 2.28% dividend, this family-favorite restaurant chain is a solid 2025 pick. The Cheesecake Factory Incorporated (NASDAQ: CAKE) operates and licenses restaurants in the United States and Canada.

The company operates bakeries that produce cheesecakes and other baked goods for its restaurants, international licensees, third-party bakery customers, external foodservice operators, retailers, and distributors.

It operates restaurants under:

• The Cheesecake Factory
• North Italia
• Flower Child
• Fox Restaurant Concepts

As of Oct. 29, 2024, Cheesecake Factory owned and operated 347 restaurants throughout the United States and Canada. Expected to post solid results for 2025, this is an excellent stock for growth and income investors looking for a tasty new idea for their portfolios.

Goldman Sachs has a $56 target price, offering an 18% upside from current levels.

Diamondback Energy

The Goldman Sachs team resumed coverage on this top energy idea play that pays a 5.06% dividend. Diamondback Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ: FANG) is an independent oil and natural gas company that acquires, develops, explores, and exploits unconventional, onshore oil and natural gas reserves in the Permian Basin in West Texas.

The company focuses on developing the Spraberry and Wolfcamp formations of the Midland Basin and the Wolfcamp and Bone Spring formations of the Delaware Basin, which are part of the Permian Basin in West Texas and New Mexico.

Diamondback Energy also owns and operates midstream infrastructure assets in the Midland and Delaware Basins of the Permian Basin.

The Goldman Sachs price target for the shares is $227. A solid 30% higher than current levels.

Nucor Corporation

This is a top steel idea and pays a solid 1.90% dividend. Nucor Corporation (NYSE: NUE) operates in three segments:

• Steel mills
• Steel products
• Raw materials

The Steel Mills segment produces:

• Hot-rolled, cold-rolled, and galvanized sheet steel products;
• Plate steel products
• Wide-flange beams, beam blanks
• H-piling and sheet piling structural steel products
• Bar steel products, such as blooms, billets, concrete reinforcing
• Merchant bars and engineered special bar quality products
• Engages in the steel trading and rebar distribution businesses.

This segment sells its products to steel service centers, fabricators, and manufacturers in the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

The Steel Products segment offers:

• Steel joists and joist girders, steel decks, and galvanized torque tubes for use in solar arrays
• Hollow structural section steel tubing, electrical conduit,
• Fabricated concrete reinforcing steel, cold-finished steel, steel fasteners, steel grating
• Expanded metal, wire and wire mesh, metal building systems, insulated metal panels, steel racking, overhead doors, and utility towers and structures for communications and energy transmission.

This segment is also involved in the piling distribution business.

The Raw Materials segment produces direct reduced iron (DRI), brokers ferrous and nonferrous metals, pig iron, hot briquetted iron, and DRI, supplies ferro-alloys, and processes ferrous and nonferrous scrap metal. It engages in natural gas production and industrial gas business.

This segment sells its ferrous scrap to electric arc furnace steel mills and foundries for manufacturing and nonferrous scrap metal to aluminum can producers, secondary aluminum smelters, steel mills, other processors, and consumers of various nonferrous metals.

This segment sells its products to steel service centers, fabricators, and manufacturers in the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

Goldman Sachs has a massive $178 target price objective, which is a 53% gain from recent trading levels

Viper Energy

With a massive 4.90% dividend, this is another energy idea with an enormous 2025 upside potential. Viper Energy, Inc. (NASDAQ: VNOM) is another top independent oil and natural gas company focused on acquiring, developing, exploring, and exploiting unconventional, onshore oil and natural gas reserves, primarily in the Permian Basin in West Texas.

The company focuses on oil and natural gas properties in the Permian Basin, which consists of approximately 75,000 square miles and is centered around Midland, Texas.

Viper Energy’s assets consist of mineral interests and royalty interests underlying 1,197,638 gross acres and 34,217 net royalty acres, primarily in the Permian Basin. Its estimated proved oil and natural gas reserves totaled 179,249 thousand barrels of crude oil equivalent (MBOE).

The Company’s proven undeveloped reserves include approximately 529 gross horizontal well locations. Its proven reserves include approximately 50% oil, 25% natural gas liquids, and 25% natural gas.

The Goldman Sachs team has a whopping $70 target price objective, 43% above current trading levels.

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