Few investors manage to become a household name, but Warren Buffett is one of them. His personal success and the success of his company, Berkshire Hathaway, have put Buffett in a class of his own when it comes to the attention he commands.
Tons of investors look to Berkshire Hathaway's portfolio and investing moves to get an idea of moves they should make. While a billionaire and trillion-dollar company don't share the same resources or investment objectives as the average investor, there's nothing wrong with looking that way for inspiration.
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If you're seeking out a couple of Buffett stocks to add to your portfolio, look no further than the following two.
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1. Amazon
Amazon(NASDAQ: AMZN) is a stock that Buffett has admitted to being hesitant about investing in, but looking back, I'd imagine he's happy he gave his managers the green light to make it happen. Since Berkshire Hathaway first bought the stock in 2019, it has more than doubled.
Amazon's stock is down quite a bit since President Donald Trump announced his new tariff plan, likely because of the high tariffs on imports from China. Amazon's e-commerce business relies heavily on third-party sellers, and many of them rely on China for their products. These tariffs could cause problems for sellers, but I don't think it's a real threat to Amazon's business in the long term.
Amazon's profit machine, its Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud service business, won't suffer too much from the new tariffs, and that's the business that makes Amazon so appealing. It's a high-margin business with many growth opportunities ahead of it, especially with artificial intelligence developments.
In fact, even if AWS were a stand-alone business, its $107.6 billion in revenue in 2024 would be greater than Bank of America's, Tesla's, and Walt Disney's. Its $39.8 billion in operating income (58% of Amazon's total in 2024) was also more than many other S&P 500 companies.
Amazon's business is more than just e-commerce and AWS, though. It's slowly but surely building an ecosystem covering a wide range of industries, including advertising, healthcare, entertainment, and logistics.
That's what makes it a great option for long-term investors. A diversified business helps Amazon weather rough economic periods (like we could be approaching soon), capitalize on emerging technologies, and maintain steady growth.
2. Visa
Visa(NYSE: V) isn't one of Berkshire Hathaway's larger holdings, but it's one of the handful I'd hold onto for the long haul without thinking twice about it.
Visa has a competitive advantage that none of its competitors can duplicate: its reach. Visa has over 4.7 billion payment credentials (cards, digital wallets, etc.), is accepted by over 150 million merchants, and processed over 310 billion transactions in the past year.
Part of Visa's huge reach comes from the network effect. Merchants are more likely to accept Visa because it's the most widely held card in the world, and people want to have a Visa card because it's the most widely accepted card in the world.
Being able to expand its reach without much additional investments (aside from infrastructure updates) is largely why Visa's business can operate with such high margins. Its 53% profit margin is higher than most businesses, in any industry, could dream of.
Aside from its rock-solid financials, Visa's a great long-term investment because of the growth of digital payments. Visa makes money each time a transaction is processed on its network, and as the world continues to shift toward digital payments, this will only increase.
In just the next four years, the digital payments market is expected to grow at a compound annual rate of close to 16%, reaching around $36.8 trillion. As the top payment processor, Visa stands to gain a lot from this increase.
Visa is here to stay and continues making the needed investments to ensure it's on top of emerging payment technologies and changing consumer preferences within different countries. That's a recipe for continued success.
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John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. American Express is an advertising partner of Motley Fool Money. Discover Financial Services is an advertising partner of Motley Fool Money. Bank of America is an advertising partner of Motley Fool Money. Stefon Walters has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Bank of America, Berkshire Hathaway, Mastercard, PayPal, Tesla, Visa, and Walt Disney. The Motley Fool recommends Discover Financial Services and recommends the following options: long January 2027 $42.50 calls on PayPal and short June 2025 $77.50 calls on PayPal. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
