Nebius Group N.V.

NBIS

Market cap $31.6B

What's the best-performing artificial intelligence (AI) stock so far this year? To make it easier for you to guess, I'll limit the field to only those with a market cap of $10 billion or more.

NBIS surges on explosive AI infrastructure growth, a $17.4B Microsoft deal and boosted guidance, but valuation risks loom.

Nebius Group (NBIS 4.43%) has been one of the most exciting stock market stories of the year so far. The company operates in the red-hot growth space of artificial intelligence (AI), offering AI customers something they need more than anything else right now: access to compute to run their workloads.

If you have been investing in artificial intelligence (AI) over the past year, then you've likely heard of the AI neocloud company Nebius Group (NBIS 4.43%), which split off from the Russian search giant Yandex and began trading on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange last October. The stock has been a moonshot and is up over 618% in the past year, due to insatiable demand for cloud computing capacity.

As the artificial intelligence (AI) boom continues to reshape industries, there has also been some attention on the companies that form the foundational infrastructure for powering AI, apart from the immediate buzz of AI chipmakers.

If you've never heard of Nebius Group (NASDAQ:NBIS) until recently, you're definitely not alone.

Nebius offers a differentiated AI infrastructure play, leveraging advanced GPU clusters, cost-efficient power solutions, and a long-term anchor contract with Microsoft. NEBIUS benefits from geographic diversity, energy efficiency in Finland, and a behind-the-meter model in New Jersey, reducing operational and permitting risks. The Microsoft contract secures near-term revenue, while AI Studio and platform services provide upside for long-term monetization and operational leverage.

IREN Limited and Nebius Group N.V. are leading AI infrastructure stocks, each with unique strengths and rapid growth. IREN leverages its profitable Bitcoin mining business to fund AI expansion, offering diversification and downside protection for investors. NBIS stands out with a vertically integrated AI-first cloud platform, strong software moat, and aggressive scaling, justifying its premium valuation.

Biggest isn't synonymous with best when it comes to investing. Sure, larger companies are often less risky than smaller ones.

Investors have piled into artificial intelligence (AI) stocks in recent years, buying shares of companies involved in various areas of the technology -- from chip designers to players in fields like voice AI. The industry offers investors a wide range of choices, and many of these have already delivered significant gains.