The escalating trade war has taken a sledgehammer to tech stocks.
The XLK technology ETF plummeted more than 4% last week, its worst of the year, after President Donald Trump ratcheted up tensions with China through a threat of new tariffs.
That sell-off has uncovered opportunities in the space, according to Paul Meeks, lead portfolio manager of WIREX fund.
"I try to have a more value-oriented style, kind of à la Warren Buffett. You know be greedy when others are fearful as he likes to say and so, I like some of the stocks that still meet my long-term themes," said Meeks on CNBC's "Trading Nation" on Friday.
Advanced Micro Devices, for example, should be bought on a pullback, says Meeks, who ran the world's largest tech fund for Merrill Lynch during the dot-com boom.
"This is an interesting play, because they got splattered a couple days ago on their quarterly conference call," said Meeks. "Here is a company that has three different product ramps, and so regardless of how the overall market grows over the next year or so they probably should take gobs of shares from both NVIDIA and Intel."
AMD plummeted 10% last Wednesday with investors dumping the stock on downbeat guidance. Its losses in the past week wiped out July's gains and brought it down to levels not seen since June.
"This company has really transformed itself under Dr. Lisa Su, the CEO. I think she's among the best in all of technology. But, here is a situation that the stock has backed off," said Meeks. "If and when it recovers, and I think this is probably a six-month scenario, that stock can be up at least 30% to 40% from where it is today."
Meeks also likes tech stocks exposed to 5G adoption, a transition he expects to happen faster than many anticipate. He pinpoints Xilinx and Qualcomm as two examples, companies which design and manufacture chips used in 5G networks.
"These are plays that should thrive in 5G, but in the near term particularly with all these geo-political shenanigans based on the trade war, we have a gap in fundamentals. I think that gap in fundamentals is going to be closed in about probably six to nine months," said Meeks. "They're probably, maybe not today, but before too long worth investing in."
Qualcomm is down more than 5% in the past week, while Xilinx slumped 9%.
Disclosure: WIREX holds AMD, QCOM and XLNX.
