Which Companies Have Wide Economic Moats? Top Picks for 2025

Having an economic moat is a strong competitive advantage for any company, and investors are happy to pay a premium for businesses with wide moats.

We’ve gone into some detail into what economic moats are in a previous post.

What defines a wide economic moat?

In our previous post, we defined 6 important aspects that can determine a moat. Companies can have economic moats with any number of these 6 characteristics, and it’s by no means an exhaustive list.

The 6 are:

• Brand intangibles

• Pricing power

• Network effect

• Switching cost

• Regulatory advantage

• IP (Intellectual Property)

Using pevaluator, you can include the moat rating in your market model and use it to reach intrinsic value estimates for thousands of companies.

2025 companies with wide economic moats

The following companies are positioned perfectly to lead their respective sectors in the future. This also means they are priced accordingly, with most investors willing to pay a premium for them.

Stock	Brand intangibles	Pricing power	Network effect	Switching cost	Regulatory advantage	Intellectual property
AAPL	✅	✅	✅	❌	❌	✅
ADBE	✅	✅	✅	✅	❌	✅
AMZN	✅	✅	✅	✅	❌	❌
ARM	❌	❌	✅	❌	❌	✅
ASML	❌	✅	❌	✅	✅	✅
AVGO	❌	✅	❌	❌	❌	✅
DIS	✅	✅	✅	❌	❌	❌
GOOGL	✅	✅	✅	❌	❌	✅
ISRG	❌	✅	❌	✅	✅	✅
KO	✅	✅	❌	❌	❌	❌
MCD	✅	✅	❌	❌	❌	❌
MCO	❌	✅	❌	❌	❌	❌
META	✅	✅	✅	✅	❌	✅
MSFT	✅	✅	❌	✅	✅	✅
NKE	✅	✅	❌	❌	❌	❌
NVDA	❌	✅	✅	❌	❌	✅
PEP	✅	✅	❌	❌	❌	❌
PG	✅	✅	❌	❌	✅	✅
RACE	✅	✅	❌	❌	❌	✅
SPGI	❌	✅	❌	❌	✅	❌
TSM	❌	✅	❌	✅	✅	✅
V	❌	✅	✅	❌	❌	❌

Contenders

Other companies with large economic moats include AbbVie, Autodesk, AMD, Booking, Cisco, J&J, Intuit, Palantir, Starbucks or Salesforce. An economic moat is not an objective measure, and companies sometimes go from a wide moat to a narrow one or vice-versa.

Why does the moat matter to investors?

Wide moat companies are essential for long-term investors because they offer a competitive edge that protects them from rivals and helps sustain profitability over time. These companies maintain dominant positions in their industries, often driven by strong brand recognition, pricing power, or network effects.

For investors, wide moat companies offer stability and lower risk, as their competitive advantages make them less vulnerable to disruption. Their ability to maintain high returns on capital over the long term is a key indicator of strong financial health. By focusing on companies with wide economic moats, investors can build a portfolio of businesses that are likely to outperform over time, delivering consistent returns and helping protect capital in volatile markets.

How much is a wide moat worth?

There’s no one answer to this question, because each investor is different.

Using a market model where economic moat has a high impact on valuation, one would expect to pay around 20% more for a company with a wide moat vs. one with a medium one.

Take for example the following two companies which are very similar with respect to our other valuation metrics (Return on invested capital, expected revenue growth and change in number of shares outstanding) - Lam Research Corp. (medium-sized moat) vs Applied Materials (wide moat). A like-minded investor would be willing to pay 18.5x earnings for $LRCX, but 22.4x earnings for $AMAT.

Conclusion

Economic moats are very important for a company and investors should be willing to pay a premium for them. That being said, they’re not the only thing one should look for, but something definitely to consider.

By defining a custom market model at pevaluator, one can reach fair price estimates for companies taking the economic moat, and other metrics, into account.