If I Had to Put $5,000 Into Just One Stock and Lose the Password Until 2036, This Would Be It.

If I had to pick one stock to invest $5,000 in right now, I would look for the cheapest stock with the most growth upside.

That stock would be Micron Technology (NASDAQ: MU). And Micron stock has plummeted about 16% over the past month, making an already great buy even better.

At its current discount, Micron is a stock to buy, lose the password, and let it cook for the next 10 years.

Image source: Getty Images.

Micron's growth

There are two simple reasons to buy Micron stock and hold it for the long term: its growth and its value.

Micron's growth has been staggering, as one of the three predominant providers of high bandwidth memory chips, which are essential for artificial intelligence computing. With so much infrastructure under construction to meet the demand for AI computing, memory for accessing information is essential. The demand for these chips is so high that it has created a supercycle, where supply can't keep up.

Micron has long been sold out of its high bandwidth memory chips for 2026 and has contracted commitments for 75% of its shipments already for fiscal 2027.

"In terms of 2027 and 2028 in our commentary, we are seeing stronger demand drivers than we've seen before," Micron President and COO Manish Bhatia said on the fourth-quarter earnings call. He added that 2027 is "shaping up with stronger demand than maybe we had seen before," and the strengthening demand allows Micron to "shift our conversations on allocation with our customers out to 2028."

Micron is also signing more long-term strategic customer agreements (SCAs) to ensure revenue keeps pouring in over the next five years and beyond. The company added 10 more SCAs in Q4, and that was after 16 were signed in Q3. Those 26 agreements and counting will account for 35% of revenue by 2030.

These SCAs will allow Micron to continue generating strong earnings even after the supercycle ends in 2029 or beyond. They will also be beneficial as new competitors emerge, particularly in China, that could potentially erode its market share there over time.

Micron's value

News of the threat from Chinese memory chip companies was one of the reasons Micron stock has dropped over the past month.

It was likely that, along with some profit-taking, Micron stock had been on a ridiculous run. Even with the recent sell-off, it is still up 216% year-to-date and 312% over the past 12 months. Over the past three years, Micron stock has a staggering 142% average annualized return.

But it is not overvalued like so many other AI stocks. In fact, it is cheap with a price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 11, a forward P/E of just 5, and a five-year P/E-to-growth (PEG) ratio of just 0.17. These figures show the massive earnings power still ahead for Micron.

It just looks like a huge opportunity to buy the dip on Micron right now.

Dave Kovaleski has positions in Micron Technology. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Micron Technology. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.