Washington’s $17.5 BILLION Bet on NUCLEAR (3 Stocks to WATCH)

Washington is going nuclear. And by that I mean the government is putting serious money, like 17.5 billion dollars, behind a new fleet of full-size nuclear reactors. What's driving the push? Well, like everything else these days, it's all about AI. Data centers are consuming power on a scale we've never seen before, and nuclear is emerging as one of the potential solutions to meet this enormous demand. And yes, when there is big money like that at stake, there are companies that have the potential to benefit greatly. That's why in this video, I'll explain what exactly on, and then reveal three stocks perfectly positioned to capitalize on this powerful trend. Now, first I should probably tell you who I am. I'm Steve Wrightmeister, but all my friends call me Wrighty. I've been investing for over 40 years, and currently a partner at Wall Street Zen, where our quant rating system pinpoints stocks with the highest likelihood of outperforming the market. Before we dive into how you can take advantage of the nuclear development, a quick request. If you enjoy market-moving stories like these, then tap that like button now. It tells YouTube to put more videos like this in front of you. So, here's the story. In late June, the Department of Energy committed up to 17.5 billion to help finance key components for 10 new large-scale nuclear reactors across five different sites. This is being done in partnership with Westinghouse Electric. As a side note, don't get all hot and bothered about Westinghouse. It's actually a private company that is not publicly traded, but I also don't want you to get it confused with the other Westinghouse, and that's Westinghouse Air Brake Technologies, which is focused on railway equipment. Now, back to the nuclear reactors. If all goes well, these reactors would generate enough electricity to power nearly 10 million homes. And this isn't just Washington writing a blank check. Before Westinghouse or its utility partners can touch a single dollar of that 17.5 billion-dollar government loan, they each have to put up 500 million of their own money, a combined 1 billion dollars per project. That's not the government fronting the risk. It's a vital filter that forces every company involved to prove they've actually committed before taxpayers on the hook for anything. Before I continue, a quick aside. If you like timely market updates like this, then the best thing you can do right now is sign up for my next live training session this coming Monday. The focus is on powerful market insights plus my top picks. Now, it's totally free, but you do need register. Do that now to join me this coming Monday at 7:00 p.m. Eastern time. Just go to wallstreetzen.com/live. Back to the nuclear buildout. Here's an important caveat. We don't actually know which utility companies are putting up that money yet. Westinghouse says it's signed letters of intent with seven potential partners, each tied to a specific project site, but none of them have been publicly identified. There's some speculation floating around with names like Dominion Energy, DTE Energy, WEC Energy, PSE&G Energy and the like getting mentioned, right? But there are two problems with speculating on these names. The first is they are not confirmed and thus there is danger in making the wrong assumption. You know what happens when you assume. Second, I ran all these maybe names through our Zen ratings quant model. This is where we review 115 different factors across 4,600 stocks to distill it down into intuitive letter grade of A through F. Indeed, the A-rated stocks are the best with a history of outperforming the S&P 500 by nearly three to one. The majority of those potential partners only earn overall D ratings. This puts them in the bottom 20% of our all stocks analyzed by our model, leading properly to a sell recommendation. This does not mean we've hit a wall on this potential opportunity, but it does require a bit more strategy shift on how to find that outperformance. So, instead of trying to guess Westinghouse's potential utility partners, I focus on the picks and shovels companies that stand to benefit regardless of who gets selected. Now, the term picks and shovels hearkens back to the California gold rush of the 1840s. Where very few of the gold miners actually made money. In fact, many of them went bust. The folks who did the best were the service providers to the miners. The people who sold them the picks and shovels, right? That is where this expression comes from. Now, a good example of that, in the case of building out technical reactors, is looking at things like the steel, electrical equipment, and cooling system that make these nuclear reactors all possible. So, that's where I'm looking for the best investment opportunities at this time. Now, before I dig into those three stocks, I need to remind you this is not personalized investment advice. So, please do your own due diligence before buying or selling anything. Here [snorts] is the setup for our first quality stock today. New power plants don't do much good if they can't connect to the grid. Someone has to build the transmission lines and substations that carry the electricity from the plant to the grid and then to the data centers. That's exactly what MYR Group does, with a symbol of MYRG. All right, this isn't just a theoretical opportunity. MYRG Group recently completed a transmission project for Dominion Energy, one of the potential partners I talked about a minute ago. Designed specifically to deliver more power to a large data center. That's the exact infrastructure bottleneck this nuclear build-out needs to overcome, and MYR is perfectly positioned to benefit. This shows up quite clearly in their recent seven-quarter earnings beat streak. Now, check out the numbers that are coming up on your screen. Check out the actual earnings results, which are downright crushing the forecast, right? Our quant model confirms the bullish enthusiasm for these shares. That's because the MYR Group comes in with an overall Zen rating of A, amounting to a strong buy recommendation. This happened because their overall fundamental scored in the top 2% of the roughly 4,600 stocks we track in the model. In addition to the overall rating, you can dig even deeper with the component grades, which groups the 115 unique factors into seven individual grades. The benefit is in discovering the unique strengths and weaknesses of a stock. So, let's take a look at that for the MYR Group. Momentum and sentiment both rank in the top 15% of all stocks tracked. Safety comes in quite a bit higher in the top 5%. That's impressive for anything even remotely related to AI. For context, even the mighty Nvidia earns a D in the safety category. Growth is a notch higher at top 4%. This bodes very well for more earnings beats in the future and financial strength is also mighty impressive in the top 3% of all stocks. Value is the one modest soft spot scoring in the middle of the pack. Yet, that value score is improving given the recent run of profit taking for MYR and their peers. There is no such thing as a perfect stock, but as you can see with MYR Group, they have a truly impressive fundamental profile as proven by the Zen Ratings analysis. Plus, they are riding a an earnings momentum hot streak and quite likely they benefit even more from the looming nuclear reactor build-up. That's a pretty darn good place to start our stock list today. By the way, if you're getting value from this video, then hit subscribe and turn on the notification bell. That's because I publish data-driven stock analysis like this every week. These actions ensure you actually get to see these videos when I publish them. All right, getting power to the AI data centers is one thing. Managing once it's inside is a whole different problem entirely. That brings us to the bull case for Invent Electric with a symbol of NV T. Note that AI chips run so hot that normal run-of-the-mill AC just doesn't cut it anymore. You need liquid cooling. Invent makes the power distribution and liquid cooling hardware that keeps AI data centers from overheating. And here's a few things that should grab your attention. Invent is now part of Nvidia's partner network and they're building a joint blueprint with Siemens for cooling and powering Nvidia's AI data centers. That's the big tech buy-in side of the story where Invent is is looking like a strongly preferred vendor in the space. Proof of that last statement shows up in their earnings results including five straight earnings beats. The last one pointing to to than 60% earnings growth year over year. Gladly signs point to that growth party continuing into the future with an expected 29.8% earnings growth rate over the next year, about twice the rate of the average stock these days. Wall Street analysts are firmly on board with Invent seeing 11 covering analysts pointing to a strong buy consensus. Even better than the recommendations is seeing the exciting upside potential packed inside many of their fair value price targets. Actually, those targets look a tad low to me if their earnings beat streak continues in the quarters ahead. Once again, the data in the Zen ratings points to a very bright future for these shares. That's because Invent also earns that same top tier grade as our previous pick, an overall Zen rating of A, based upon the fundamental profile scoring the top 3% of all stocks we track. Let's now drill down into those component grades and see what else it tells us. Momentum ranks in the top 17% of all stocks. They say a body in motion stays in motion. Better yet, financial strength comes in the top 15%. Growth is top nine, no shame in that game, and the standout grade is sentiment, coming in the top 7% of all stocks. This is the smart money signal, and it's never a bad idea to follow their lead. Nvidia choosing Invent as their partner for powering and cooling data centers, well, that's a pretty reason to appreciate the bullish premise for these shares. Add on top the strong Wall Street support and fundamental prowess shown in the Zen ratings, and you have another great stock to add to your watch list today. The prior two companies build the grid and cool the racks, and the final company might be the most direct bet on nuclear itself. Before we get to that pick, one quick thing. If you want to stay one step ahead of the market, then join me live every Monday at 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time. That's when I share my updated market outlook and trading plan to outperform. It's also where I unveil my trade of the week based upon our proven Zen ratings quant model and my greater than 40 years of investing experience. Now, gladly it's a free event, but you do need register. Just go to wallstreetzen.com/live or click the link in the description below or scan the QR code on your screen right now. Just pause the video for a moment to sign up. I can be patient and wait for you, but I look forward to seeing you on Monday. Back to the topic at hand. Right now, the boss of America's biggest steel maker is pounding the table for more nuclear power to be built out. I'm talking about the CEO of Nucor with a symbol NUE. His logic is dead simple. AI data centers have full-blown power demand from megawatts up to gigawatts, and he says solar and wind alone can't feed that need. Nuclear is the clear answer. This begs the question, why does this steel guy care so much about nuclear energy? Well, two reasons emerge. Nucor is actually an equity investor in Nuscale, one of the leading builders of next generation small nuclear reactors, and Nucor supplies the steel for basically the entire buildout from the data centers to the towers carrying the power lines. So, Nucor wins from the reactors, the data centers, and the grid all at once. According to analysts, Nucor's earnings per share is expected to grow by 20% a year over the next 3 years, compounding from roughly $10 a share this year to about $17 per share by 2029, right? That's a 70% increase when you get all the compounding in place. That obviously matters a lot because stock prices tend to follow earnings. So, if Nucor delivers anything close to that growth, then shares could should continue to outperform for years ahead. Speaking of analysts, the consensus recommendation is currently a strong buy with several top-rated analysts pounding the table on shares and forecasting ample upside potential ahead for the share price. The drumbeat from Wall Street will likely grow much louder after the impressive Q2 earnings beat they just served up in late July. Nucor scores the highest of any stock we talk about today according to the Zen ratings quant model. So, truly, I saved the best for last. Note that our coveted A ratings are only given to the top 5% analyzed by the model. In this case, Newcore is in the elite fundamental profile category of the top 1%. So, maybe calling it A+ is a bit more accurate. That strength shows up mightily in the component grades as well, starting with the top 16% showing for safety, followed by top 15% all stocks for the AI timeliness grade. Growth is a notch better in the top 13%. Financials top 12%, sentiment top 7%, and then we round it out with momentum in the top 3%. That is a lot of good stuff packed into these shares, and you can truly see that they are firing on all cylinders. And as for today's focus on AI data centers and demand for nuclear power, Newcore is set to benefit on virtually every front. That is why I added Newcore to my Zen Investor Newsletter portfolio, where I feature my top 20 stocks for the long haul. So, there's your road map. Three companies supplying the necessary components for this massive nuclear buildup. So, which of these three stocks is your favorite? Or is there another nuclear name you think I should feature in a future video? Drop in the comment section below for the benefit of our community. And if you want my read on another exciting corner of the market, then check out the video that's popping up on your screen right now. In that one, I broke down the best quantum computing stocks to profit from that amazing emerging growth trend.