Key Points
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In addition to the rise of artificial intelligence (AI), excitement surrounding stock splits has played a key role in lifting the broader market.
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Two members of the Magnificent Seven have significant retail investor ownership, which can spur the need for a forward split.
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Furthermore, these two Mag-7 components offer cash-rich balance sheets and well-defined competitive advantages.
Since the mid-1990s, investors have almost always had a game-changing innovation to garner their interest. At the moment, nothing has earned more hype than the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution.
But every so often, more than one next-big-thing trend can exist at the same time. In addition to having AI lift Wall Street’s major stock indexes to new heights, stock-split euphoria has played a key role in boosting valuations for some of the market’s leading businesses.
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Excitement surrounding stock splits has taken hold on Wall Street
A stock split is a tool public companies have at their disposal to adjust their share price and outstanding share count by the same factor. These adjustments are purely surface-scratching and have no impact on a company’s market cap or its underlying operating performance.
Even though these changes are cosmetic, investors view the two types of stock splits as polar opposites.
On one hand, reverse splits are typically avoided. This type of split, which is designed to increase a company’s share price, is often something you see from struggling businesses that are attempting to avoid delisting from a major stock exchange.
In comparison, investors gravitate to businesses announcing and completing forward splits. Companies that have to reduce their share price to make it more nominally affordable for everyday investors who can’t buy fractional shares are, in many instances, out-executing and out-innovating their peers.
To date, three influential businesses have completed a forward split in 2025. However, investors are eagerly awaiting the first true blockbuster stock-split announcement of the year. It’s quite possible two members of the “Magnificent Seven” could answer the call.
The Magnificent Seven stocks have crushed it over the trailing decade. NVDA data by YCharts. Returns from Aug. 13, 2015-Aug. 13, 2025.
Two Magnificent Seven stocks appear primed to announce a forward split
The Magnificent Seven (“Mag-7” for short) consists of seven of the most influential businesses on Wall Street, as well as seven of the 10 public companies on U.S. exchanges to have ever reached the trillion-dollar valuation plateau:
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Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA)
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Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT)
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Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL)
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Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOGL)(NASDAQ: GOOG)
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Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN)
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Meta Platforms (NASDAQ: META)
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Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA)
What better place to find Wall Street’s next blockbuster stock-split stock than among its most prominent businesses?
But just because these are some of the most influential and high-flying stocks on Wall Street, that doesn’t mean they’re all automatically primed for a forward split. For instance, Nvidia completed a historic 10-for-1 forward split in June 2024 and will currently set investors back around $182 per share.
Likewise, Amazon and Alphabet conducted respective 20-for-1 forward splits in June and July 2022, which brought their share prices down from the stratosphere to approximately $225 and $202, as of the closing bell on Aug. 13. It’s unlikely that retail investors are being restricted from buying shares of Nvidia, Amazon, and Alphabet.
On the other hand, the respective share prices of Meta Platforms and Microsoft have become prohibitive for some investors who lack the ability to purchase fractional shares. In other words, Meta and Microsoft both have a strong case to become 2025’s blockbuster stock-split stocks.
Image source: Getty Images.
Meta Platforms
Social media colossus Meta Platforms is the most logical of all Mag-7 stocks to announce a forward split, given its nearly $800 share price. It’s also the only member of the Magnificent Seven that’s never completed a split.
But there’s more to identifying a stock-split candidate than just a high share price. Since institutional investors aren’t in need of a lower nominal share price, companies often need meaningful retail investor ownership to encourage a split. More than 27% of Meta’s outstanding shares are held by everyday investors, which is a sizable enough figure for Meta’s board to consider taking the plunge.
Aside from the almost $800 price tag accompanying Meta’s shares, what could prompt a split announcement is the company’s bright future and the growing likelihood that its stock will head substantially higher over time.
Though Meta’s future is dependent on the evolution of AI, it remains a powerhouse in the advertising realm. Meta’s social media sites — Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, Threads, and Facebook Messenger — were responsible for attracting 3.48 billion daily users to its family of apps in the month of June. Since no other social media company comes close to these figures, Meta is afforded exceptional pricing power for ad placement.
Artificial intelligence is helping Meta Platforms deliver double-digit growth in ad sales. Giving businesses access to generative AI solutions, which can help tailor messages to specific users and improve ad click-through rates, is a practical way AI investments are paying off almost immediately for Mark Zuckerberg’s company.
Furthermore, AI will be relied on to fuel growth in the metaverse, which is the 3D virtual world where users can interact with each other and their surroundings. Zuckerberg’s aggressive metaverse investments should allow his company to be a primary on-ramp to this virtual environment in the years to come.
Don’t overlook Meta’s cash pile, either. It closed out the midpoint of 2025 with more than $47 billion in cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities and is pacing more than $99 billion in net cash generated from operating activities this year. It has the balance sheet and operating cash flow that affords risk-taking.
Microsoft
Although Meta has the highest nominal share price among members of the Mag-7, it would be no surprise if software juggernaut Microsoft became the blockbuster stock-split stock of 2025 that investors are waiting for.
Microsoft is no stranger to splitting its stock. Since going public in March 1986, it’s completed nine forward splits, which would have turned one share at its initial public offering into 288 shares currently.
However, the stock market’s second-largest company by market cap hasn’t completed a split since February 2003. But with its share price now well above $500, and over a third of its outstanding shares held by retail investors, the impetus for a split is stronger than ever.
Similar to Meta, Microsoft’s long-term outlook is bright, which strongly suggests its share price will head even higher in the years and decades to come. That provides even more of a catalyst for the company to announce its first split in 22 years.
Microsoft is very much relying on artificial intelligence to grease its growth engine. Introducing generative AI solutions and tools that allow clients to build and train large language models within Azure have boosted sales for the world’s No. 2 cloud infrastructure service platform. During the fiscal fourth quarter (Microsoft’s fiscal year ends on June 30), Azure delivered a year-over-year sales jump of 39%, signaling just how powerful AI is as a growth driver.
While AI and cloud computing are proving instrumental to Microsoft’s sustained double-digit growth rate, investors shouldn’t overlook the importance of the company’s legacy Windows and Office segments. Though the growth heydays for these divisions are long gone, they continue to generate high-margin operating cash flow that Microsoft can use to make acquisitions or reinvest in other high-growth initiatives.
It also offers one heck of a capital-return program. Though its dividend yield may not be much to look at, Microsoft led all public companies with more than $24 billion paid in dividends to its shareholders in fiscal 2025. It also added north of $18 billion in share buybacks, which can boost earnings per share over time.
Microsoft and Meta are ideally positioned to be the most anticipated stock-split stocks of 2025.
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Sean Williams has positions in Alphabet, Amazon, and Meta Platforms. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta Platforms, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Tesla. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2026 $395 calls on Microsoft and short January 2026 $405 calls on Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.