The Smartest Growth Stock to Buy With $10,000 Right Now

By Geoffrey Seiler – Mar 16, 2026 at 3:12AM ESTKey PointsAmazon's stock is trading at a big discount to its retail peers despite seeing stronger growth.The company also has a big opportunity to drive growth at AWS.If you're looking to make a large investment in a single stock, like $10,000, the first stock I'd be drawn to is Amazon (AMZN 0.87%). With that type of cash, you could buy just under 50 shares of the stock. Let's look at what makes Amazon's stock so enticing at current levels. Image source: The Motley Fool. A cheap growth stock with a lot of opportunities Amazon's stock has admittedly not done much over the past five years. In fact, the stock is up only around 35% during that stretch, which is about half of the return of the S&P 500 index. One of the most intriguing things about Amazon is its valuation, but that's far from the only thing that makes it attractive. The stock trades at a forward price-to-earnings ratio (P/E) of 27 times analyst estimates, which is a huge discount to its brick-and-mortar rivals, Walmart and Costco, which both trade at more than 40 times multiples. At the same time, Amazon's retail business is growing both its revenue and profits more quickly. ExpandNASDAQ: AMZNAmazonToday's Change(-0.87%) $-1.83Current Price$207.70Key Data PointsMarket Cap$2.2TDay's Range$206.23 - $210.5652wk Range$161.38 - $258.60Volume1.6MAvg Vol49MGross Margin50.29% One of the reasons I really like Amazon's stock is that while it has lagged, the company has been doing some really great things behind the scenes to improve efficiency and drive operating leverage in its e-commerce operations. The company hasn't gotten much credit for it, but it has a big advantage being the largest developer and operator of robots in the world. It now has more than 1 million robots in its fulfillment centers, and it is constantly pushing their capabilities. Meanwhile, it is also using artificial intelligence (AI) to coordinate its robot fleet, as well as for things like inventory management and to better optimize delivery routes. This helped lead to its North American e-commerce business seeing a 24% jump in operating income on a 10% increase in sales. In addition, Amazon has a big opportunity with its cloud computing business, Amazon Web Services (AWS). The company created the entire cloud industry, and it remains the market share leader today. That size has meant that its growth has been slower than its smaller peers, but its cloud revenue growth has started to accelerate. Toward the end of last year, it built a large data center for Anthropic using its custom chips, and Amazon also recently struck a partnership and made a large investment in OpenAI. Together with ramping up its data center capital expenditures (capex) this year, this should help drive growth moving forward. The company has also talked about leaning more into developing its own foundational AI model, given the cost advantage it has through its own chips. That's just another potential growth driver that right now just isn't priced into the stock. Between its valuation, strong e-commerce operating leverage, and cloud growth opportunities, Amazon is a top growth stock to invest in right now.Read NextMar 16, 2026 •By Neil PatelThe Best 4 Retail Stocks to Buy and Hold for DecadesMar 15, 2026 •By Geoffrey SeilerGot $1,000? 3 Stocks to Buy in March While They're on Sale.Mar 13, 2026 •By Leo SunThe Best Blue Chip Stock to Buy After This Year's Market PullbackMar 13, 2026 •By Adria CiminoGot $1,000? 3 Stocks to Buy Now While They're On SaleMar 13, 2026 •By Dave KovaleskiAmazon Is Down 7% in 2026. Is This a Once-in-a-Lifetime Buying Opportunity?Mar 12, 2026 •By Manali Pradhan, CFAThe Best Stocks to Invest $1,000 in Right NowAbout the AuthorGeoffrey Seiler is a contributing Motley Fool stock market analyst covering technology, consumer goods, healthcare, energy, and materials stocks. Prior to The Motley Fool, Geoffrey was a senior equity analyst at Raging Capital Management, a $600 million long-short hedge fund. He holds a bachelor’s degree in history from Haverford College.TMFFindProfitStocks MentionedAmazonNASDAQ: AMZN$207.67(-0.89%)-$1.86WalmartNASDAQ: WMT$126.57(+0.99%)+$1.24Costco WholesaleNASDAQ: COST$1,008.34(+0.50%)+$5.02*Average returns of all recommendations since inception. Cost basis and return based on previous market day close.