BMO's Investment Chief Just Predicted a 17% Stock Market Gain for 2022 — Ignore the Bears and Make Room for These 3 'Outperform' Stocks

1. Pfizer (PFE)

It was just last week that BMO Capital initiated an “outperform” rating for pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, signaling that the company could outdo many competitors next year.

Pfizer’s share price is hovering around $53. BMO has projected it to hit $60.

Pfizer’s vaccine business is the obvious draw here, with COVID-generated revenue likely to continue rolling in over the next year. But the company’s solid financials and pipeline of new products should help it maintain the momentum it has built this year.

Pfizer just wrapped up a wild third quarter that saw revenues hit $24.1 billion — 134% higher than during the same period last year.

Year-to-date, Pfizer stock has risen 44%. It’s gained over 4% in the last week alone.

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2. Palo Alto Networks (PANW)

BMO already bestowed an “outperform” rating on Palo Alto Networks after the cybersecurity firm released its Q1 earnings. Not only does that rating still hold, but BMO recently raised its price target for the company from $560 to $615.

Everything seems to be trending in the right direction for the company.

Its Q3 revenue beat analyst expectations by about $50 million, and was 28% higher year over year. Inflation has allowed Palo Alto to increase prices, and the steady growth of the cloud computing space means an increasing number of businesses should require its technology.

Palo Alto Networks is projecting revenue of around $5.3 billion for 2022. That rosy outlook has helped lift the company’s share price by about 48% since Aug. 23.

3. Alphabet (GOOGL)

Similar to Palo Alto Networks, BMO had already identified Alphabet, Google’s parent company, as an “outperform” candidate prior to the release of its third quarter earnings report. BMO then swiftly upped its target price for Alphabet from $3,000 to $3,200 per share.

Alphabet’s Q3 performance was predictably colossal. The $18.9 billion in profit marked the company’s fifth record-breaking quarter in a row. The revenue brought in during the third quarter, $65.1 billion, was almost $19 billion higher than in the same period last year.

Revenue from search and YouTube advertising continues to rise, as does the cash coming in from Google Cloud. Alphabet makes it difficult for investors to know how its Pixel phones and Android operating system are faring among consumers, but when your profits are increasing by 69% year over year, there’s not much reason to nitpick.

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