3 Top Tech Stocks Stand Out at Gigantic Amazon Web Services Conference

By Lee Jackson Published Oct 9, 9:15AM EDT

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Amazon is known for almost totally dominating product sales on the Internet, but another area the mega-cap tech giant is starting to dominate is cloud computing services with the company’s wildly successful Amazon Web Services (AWS). Deutsche Bank attended the huge AWS conference in Las Vegas, along with 19,000 others, and came away very positive on three top technology companies.

In a new research report, Deutsche Bank was very impressed with the AWS innovation and the incredible enterprise adoption. The report pointed out that General Electric has said it is moving 60% of the company’s information technology workloads to AWS. The firm also came away impressed with three top software stocks, all of which are rated Buy at Deutsche Bank.

Microsoft

This top technology stock should not only do fine in the coming rising rate environment, but give investors some degree of mega-cap tech safety. Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) stock has gapped up and down this year on earnings, and while the release of the new Windows 10 has put some focus back on the software giant, some bugs in the software have cause update issues, and those are reportedly being dealt with.

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The Deutsche Bank team points to the fact that among the large-cap IT players, the feedback on Microsoft at the conference was very positive, and they were surprised at how frequently Azure, which is the company’s cloud computing platform offering, was flagged as a rival to Amazons AWS service. They also noted that Microsoft is discounting Azure for large enterprises, so it may end being cheaper than AWS for larger users.

Microsoft investors are paid a very solid 3.1% dividend. The Deutsche Bank price objective is $55, and the consensus price target is $50.17. The stock closed Thursday at $47.45.
Qlik Technologies

This company beat second-quarter earnings estimates. Qlik Technologies Inc.’s (NASDAQ: QLIK) QlikView Business Discovery platform lets people quickly bring data sources together to create dynamic visual applications that can be navigated and searched intuitively. QlikView uses Natural Analytics to reflect the way human curiosity searches and processes information, while delivering the enterprise manageability, governance and service offerings organizations require.

The company’s new Qlik Sense product, which has helped push the company in the business intelligence and analytic market, is seeing strong demand trends as the second-quarter licensing total of $76.3 million was much higher than estimates and the strongest since 2011. New customer license and maintenance billings were up 35% in the United States and 28% in the European Union.

Deutsche Bank expects that the company will continue to focus on what it calls the “cloud roadmaps” going forward, and that new analytics product that made its debut at the conference will have little if any impact on the company’s overall business.

The Deutsche Bank price target for the stock is $50, and the consensus target is $45.56. The stock closed most recently at $36.86.

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Tableau Software

This was a red-hot stock but has taken a huge hit since July and is offering aggressive accounts a great entry point. Tableau Software Inc. (NASDAQ: DATA) provides business analytics software products in the United States and internationally. The company offers Tableau Desktop, a self-service analytics environment that empowers people to access and analyze data independently, as well as Tableau Server and Tableau Public, a free cloud-based platform for analyzing and sharing public data. The company’s business intelligence platform with data management and scalability has the security to foster the sharing of data.

Many on Wall Street are sold on the company’s ability to sustain solid revenue growth and have a very positive opinion of the corporate management and strategy. Some even think that the company is currently taking share from every vendor. The Deutsche Bank analysts point out the Tableau connects to the AWS data stores and is also pursuing the “cloud roadmap” strategy.

In addition, the company recently announced the launch of its Shanghai operations, Tableau (China), as the company expands in China to better serve customers and partners locally. With 1.3 billion people, a quickly expanding urban economy and exponential rates of Internet and smartphone penetration, China generates an immense amount of data annually. Tableau can help bring that data to life for corporations seeking to assimilate the huge data input.

The Deutsche Bank price target is $130, above the consensus price objective of $122.73. Shares ended Thursday at $79.56.

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Cloud computing continues to grow almost unabated, and the Deutsche Bank stock picks give aggressive investors numerous ways to play this incredible technology trend.

About the Author Lee Jackson →

Lee Jackson has covered Wall Street analysts' equity and debt research and equity strategy daily for 24/7 Wall St. since 2012. His broad and diverse career, which included a stint as the creative services director at the NBC affiliate in Austin, Texas, gives him unique insight into the financial industry and world.

Lee Jackson's journey in the financial industry spans over 30 years, with nearly two decades as an institutional equity salesperson at Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers, and Morgan Stanley. His career was marked by his presence on the sell side during pivotal Wall Street events, from the dot.com rise and bubble to the Long Term Capital Management debacle, 9/11, and the Great Recession of 2008. This is a testament to his resilience and adaptability in the face of market volatility.

Lee Jackson’s practical financial industry experience, acquired from a career at some of the biggest banks and brokerage firms, is complemented by a lifetime of writing on various platforms. This unique combination allows him to shed light on the intricacies and workings of Wall Street in a way that only someone with deep insider experience and knowledge can. Moreover, his extensive network across Wall Street continues to provide direct access for him and 24/7 Wall St., a privilege few firms enjoy.

Since 2012, Jackson’s work for 24/7 Wall St. has been featured in Barron’s, Yahoo Finance, MarketWatch, Business Insider, TradingView, Real Money, The Street, Seeking Alpha, Benzinga, and other media outlets. He attended the prestigious Cranbrook Schools in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, and has a degree in broadcasting from the Specs Howard School of Media Arts.