Bitcoin (BTC) delivered the worst performance in 2021 of the last three years. And the crypto still trounced numerous stocks, with its price skyrocketing more than 60%.

But Bitcoin has gotten off to a rocky start in 2022 so far. Do not be surprised if Bitcoin lags behind quite a few other stocks this year. Here are two unstoppable stocks that have the potential of beating Bitcoin in 2022.

1. Innovative Industrial Properties

Innovative Industrial Properties shares have fallen a lot more than BTC’s price so far this year. However, I believe the downturn will be more temporary than anything else. IIP’s company is as strong as ever.

The cannabis-focused REIT has added 28 new properties just in Q4 of 2021. IIP now owns 103 properties throughout 19 states. The properties are all leased to cannabis growers.

While BTC’s fortunes are completely subject to the whims of its traders, IIP has better control over its stock performance. If the business could find more properties to lease and purchase, its revenue is likely to keep increasing. And if its earnings were to grow enough, its share price would almost certainly jump as well.

This might seem like a simple task for the company to accomplish. There are an additional 17 states that have legalized marijuana in some form where the business does not currently operate. The company also has plenty of other growth opportunities within its existing markets.

Perhaps the largest threat to IIP is that large cannabis reform on the federal level will be passed that attracts even more competition. However, such reform will more than likely be a net positive for IIP.

2. PayPal Holdings

The shift to digital payments is becoming an unstoppable force. PayPal Holdings (PYPL) is a top player in digital payments with about 75% of the leading 1,500 retailers in Europe and North America supporting its digital wallet. This helps make PayPal an unstoppable stock.

Granted, PayPal did not seem unstoppable this past year. Its shares dropped 19% during what was considered a bull market for most other stocks. A large part of the issue was that the company’s earnings growth slowed down when compared to 2020. But it shouldn’t have been much of a surprise considering the big spike in online buying with the forced pandemic lockdowns in the year prior.

Some of PayPal’s new features on its app (including the support for trading BTC and some other cryptos) are attracting users. PayPal can bounce back in a major way this year. And in the future, the stock has the potential to be truly unstoppable.

In my view, some of the best stocks are the ones that have strong underlying companies and exceptional growth possibilities. They are the kinds of stocks that you could comfortably invest a large amount of money in with confidence that you will likely make market-beating returns in the future.

Here are two of my picks for the best stocks you can invest $10,000 in right now.

1. Nvidia

Find the strongest players in the quickest-growing areas. That is usually a great way to find the best stocks to purchase. There is no question Nvidia should be in this group.

One of those fast-growing areas is gaming. The company’s GPUs are the gold standard for powering gaming computers. The business seems likely to have a very big winner with its new RTX350 entry-level graphics card that will soon be released. Nvidia is also going to release a monster graphics card for the higher-end market segment.

The company’s GPUs are also more suited for AI apps running on servers located in data centers. This is actually an even faster expanding market for Nvidia than gaming is.

Then there is the metaverse. Nvidia already released Omniverse, its platform for 3D design and collaboration. CEO Jensen Huang believes that Omniverse Avatars has an addressable market of around $40 billion. The opportunities out there for Nvidia’s GPUs in the metaverse are even better.

Those are not Nvidia’s only potential drivers of growth, though. Its self-driving car tech might make the company a lot more cash over the next ten years and beyond.

2. MercadoLibre

Unlike Nvidia, MercadoLibre did not deliver great gains in 2021. Its shares dropped nearly 20%. But that helps make the stock’s valuation a much more attractive one considering its high growth prospects.

MercadoLibre’s terrible performance this last year was not due to underlying issues with its company. The company’s net earnings soared 72.9% on a constant-currency basis in Q3 of 2021. Earnings increased more than sixfold. And Q3 was a difficult quarter for year-over-year comparisons.

The future seems to be a bright one for the company. MercadoLibre’s e-commerce platform has been attracting new buyers. Retention levels are rising. The e-commerce penetration level in Latin America might double by 2025.

Don’t think of MercadoLibre as just an e-commerce business, though. Its Mercado Pago fintech and Mercado Envios logistics companies are rocking as well. The fintech opportunity should be highly attractive in light of the large amount of people in Latin America without any banking services.

Now looks like a great time to buy Bitcoin (CRYPTO:BTC). It currently trades at almost 40% below its all-time high, but the optimism coming from institutional investors — a group that is increasingly bullish on BTC– could be translated into 10X gains (or more) in the coming years. Here is what you should know.

The principles of supply and demand

With its release in 2009, BTC has become the first modern crypto. It wowed the entire world with blockchain tech, a record-keeping system managed by a decentralized network of crypto miners rather than a centralized institution such as a bank. To that end, BTC acts like electronic cash, letting people transact digitally without having to use a bank or use a credit card.

However, the importance of BTC’s popularity should not be overlooked. Despite being the oldest crypto, it continues to be the leading crypto, with a market capitalization of around $800 billion. That implies strong demand for the coin, which is noteworthy in light of the limited supply. Specifically, Bitcoin’s source code imposes a hard limit of 21 million coins, meaning it is a finite asset. And basic economics tell us that when demand is higher than supply, the price of an asset will increase.

Despite the recent crypto crash, I do not think the current troubles will hinder long-term demand for BTC. In fact, there is a catalyst at work that might significantly increase demand in the future.

Institutional adoption

A new study from Fidelity shows that 52% of institutional traders own digital assets, and BTC is the most popular digital asset owned by those big money managers. More importantly, the study indicated that 71% of institutional investors have plans to diversify into digital assets. Which means they are starting to become increasingly bullish on crypto.

Another report recently released indicates that 62% of institutional traders without current exposure will buy crypto in the next year, and 82% of institutional traders plan to boost exposure to digital assets by 2023. In all cases, that increasing demand for digital assets will be a tailwind for BTC, driving its price up over the long run.

As a final thought, Cathie Wood thinks institutions will eventually invest 5% of their money into crypto– a sizable number, since institutional traders now have over $100 trillion in assets under management. To that end, Wood thinks the price of BTC will reach $500,000 by 2026, implying an increase of over 1,000% from its current price. That is why now looks like a great time to purchase this cryptocurrency.

Tilly’s (NYSE:TLYS) is headquartered in Irvine, CA. Like many other non-essential companies, it was devastated during the pandemic when it had to close its doors to in-person shopping.

That being said, Tilly’s is rebounding from the pandemic stronger than ever, reporting record profits and sales. Management thinks that momentum will continue throughout this year. Here is why Tilly’s could be a surprising growth stock in 2022.

Tilly’s is thriving

In the nine months ended October 30, Tilly’s net sales were 22.5% higher than they were during the same time in 2019. That is impressive, considering the Covid pandemic is still spiking today. Tilly’s is a brick-and-mortar accessories and apparel retailer with 243 stores open throughout the U.S. but mainly concentrated in Texas, Florida and California. Its products are made for young adults and pre-teens.

Management should be commended for the excellent job they did managing the company during the pandemic and ensuing supply chain shortages that have followed. Companies worldwide are reporting difficulty securing enough supplies to meet existing consumer demands. Those like Tilly’s that have secured the inventory they need reap the benefits of supply troubles at competitors. For instance, if the industry is short on supply, there will be less promotional activities like discounting.

Indeed, in its most recent quarter ended October 30, Tilly’s announced a gross profit margin of 37.2%, the highest since becoming a public company. The highest gross profit margin it had reached in the last decade was 32.2% in 2012.

Another benefit of having enough inventory when your competitors have fallen short is attracting disappointed customers. That might have played a big advantage for Tilly’s during the holidays. While Tilly’s holiday quarter figures haven’t been released yet, there is reason to believe their sales were robust. As of October 30, Tilly’s had inventories of $87 million, which is up from the $66 million it had during the same time last year. What’s more, the management team gave an update on its comparable net sales through November 30, saying it grew by 19.6% when compared to the year prior.

Tilly’s is in expansion mode

Tilly’s plans to open 15 to 20 new stores this year. That is an accelerated pace of new stores opening from 2021 when the business opened just five new stores. Tilly’s most certainly has the balance sheet to fund this expansion, with $155.6 million in securities and cash with no debt to its name. All in all, Tilly’s might be a surprise growth stock for 2022.

In November, Shiba Inu (Shib) Games project head Shytoshi Kusama said on Medium that “the future of gaming is Shib Inu.” Could Shib be a big metaverse winner?

Metaverse mania

Ever since Facebook announced it was changing its name to Meta Platforms in late Oct., we have seen a type of metaverse mania. The interest shown by Investors relating to stocks that might profit from the metaverse has soared.

Gaming tokens with their own “metaverses” have also seen huge booms. Decentraland jumped more than sixfold in just a few weeks. The Sandbox went up well over 8 times.

But while these metaverse cryptos were soaring, Shib was dropping. The meme coin was completely missing out on the metaverse craze. However, it seems that this will only be a short term situation.

Kusama’s Medium article released on Nov. 26 laid out his vision for Shib’s future. He asked: “What is Shib Inu becoming? How can Shib Inu grow into more than anyone thinks possible?” And his answer was that Shib’s destination is the metaverse.

Two big steps forward

Shiba Inu has taken two big steps forward in achieving Kusama’s vision. First, William Volk was added to the team as a consultant to lead the development.

Volk boasts an impressive record of creating games. He served as VP of technology for Activision Blizzard. He was over the creation of many successful games during his time with the business. Volk has also worked with many other gaming businesses during his long career.

Kusama’s Medium article hinted that an AAA gaming studio had been lined up. On Dec.7 as well, the identity of that studio has been revealed. Playside Studios said that it had agreed to an eight-month contract with Shib Games to “create a multiplayer Collectable Card game which is planned for release on multiple platforms.”

Playside ranks as the biggest publicly traded video games creator in Australia. It has created more than 50 games, including some with major studios such as Warner Bros., Pixar, Nickelodeon and Disney.

A monster metaverse winner?

The game that Playside is creating for Shib Games will target mobile users and won’t be based on the blockchain. However, Kusama said the game will only be licensed to the Shib decentralized team to add into the Shibarium layer-2 solution that was built on the Ethereum blockchain. Ultimately, this will transform into the “Oshiverse” — Shib’s own metaverse.

These efforts might put to rest some of the criticisms that Shib does not have any competitive advantages. Kasama claims that Shib “is positioned to be a top player in the gaming landscape this year.” That is probably a bit of a stretch, considering that the first game being created by Playside is not scheduled to be released until the first quarter of 2023.

On the other hand, Oshiverse might truly offer unique capabilities that help set it apart from its competitors. Will Shiba Inu be a big metaverse winner? Maybe eventually. But it is a waiting game for now.