2 Superior Growth Stocks to Buy and Hold for 10 Years

Building wealth in the stock market isn't about chasing hot trends. It's about owning high-quality businesses that can compound in value and potentially beat the market over long periods.

Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) and Visa (NYSE: V) are quality stocks that can help investors do exactly that. Analysts expect both companies to grow earnings at double-digit rates over the next several years. Here's why these growth stocks can deliver superior results for patient investors.

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1. Amazon

Amazon shares returned 560% over the past 10 years, beating the S&P 500's
251%. The stock has been roughly in line with the index so far in 2026. Even so, analysts expect Amazon's earnings to grow about 20% annually in the years ahead -- a pace that can still support market-beating returns.

Amazon reported 20% year-over-year sales growth last quarter, with two of its largest segments -- online retail and Amazon Web Services (AWS) -- showing accelerating revenue growth.

The cloud market is competitive, with Microsoft right behind Amazon in market share. But Amazon may continue to benefit from its lead. CEO Andy Jassy put it this way: "Customers choose AWS because we offer the broadest capabilities. They want their AI inference to reside near their other applications and data, and more of it resides in AWS than anywhere else."

AWS revenue grew 37% year over year in the second quarter to $42 billion, with a 39% operating margin. Jassy believes AWS could potentially reach $1 trillion in annual revenue. At today's margin, that could mean roughly $400 billion in operating profit from AWS alone.

Demand for cloud services continues to outpace data center capacity, which means Amazon can convert every dollar of new investment in data centers into revenue very quickly. Even with aggressive expansion, Jassy expects demand to outweigh supply through 2027, and he described demand for 2028 as "striking" on the Q2 earnings call.

AWS has a contracted backlog of $496 billion, growing at a triple-digit rate. If AWS approaches $1 trillion in annual revenue within a decade or so, Amazon's $2.8 trillion market cap leaves plenty of room for upside.

2. Visa

Shares of Visa climbed 366% over the last 10 years, outperforming the market, and it still operates one of the dominant payment networks with a long runway for growth.

Visa operates like a tollbooth on global payments. It doesn't issue credit cards or take on that credit risk. Instead, it runs the network that authorizes, clears, and settles transactions. It shares a virtual duopoly with Mastercard, allowing the company to earn an extraordinarily high profit margin of 50%.

Even with uneven consumer spending pressures from inflation and gas prices, Visa's payment volume rose 10% year over year in the second quarter, while revenue climbed 14% to $11.6 billion. Total volume topped $4 trillion for the first time in a single quarter.

One of Visa's biggest opportunities is in value-added services, such as fraud protection and software running on top of its network. Revenue from these services rose 34% year over year in constant currency last quarter. This growth reflects the strength of Visa's competitive position, as most of this revenue is tied to transactions, cards, and accounts already running on Visa's payment rails.

A sluggish economy can weigh on consumer spending and slow growth. Still, over the long term, Visa's revenue will likely continue to grow at double-digit rates, with earnings growing slightly faster. The opportunity ahead is still substantial, with more than $20 trillion in consumer spending still paid with cash, checks, and other non-card methods.

At 28 times forward earnings, Visa is trading within its historical range. The stock should compound with earnings over the long term -- a setup that can still produce market-beating performance.

John Ballard has positions in Amazon. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Mastercard, Microsoft, and Visa. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.