The metaverse is going to be big. I mean really big. Market estimates vary widely - and wildly.

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeny used the phrase "multitrillion-dollar" in reference to the metaverse's potential. Roblox Corp. (NYSE: RBLX) chief David Baszucki projects the metaverse will be a $200 billion market, while Bloomberg Intelligence puts the figure at closer to $800 billion.

If a fraction of that potential is realized, it'll be one of the most lucrative investing trends of the 21^st century.

Of course, the metaverse is nowhere near being fully realized, but it's already handing well-positioned investors the kind of huge profits that come from owning companies providing the critical infrastructure used to make a virtual universe a reality.

Photo by Richard Horvath on Unsplash

Meta Platforms Inc. (Nasdaq: FB) - the company formerly known as Facebook - has already invested more than $16 billion in building and operating 18 Facebook Cloud campuses in the United States. It expects to invest as much as $34 billion as it retools its data centers and networks for the demands of a fully global, fully realized, and functional metaverse.

The Facebook spend is big, that's for sure, but it's only part of a global demand explosion for data centers. And it is an "explosion" - by the time 2021 is out, global data center infrastructure spending will hit $200 billion.

That is an (almost) unbelievable profit "tailwind" for companies supporting and involved in these data center buildouts.

And here's the one I think everyone needs to own now...

The One Thing the Metaverse Needs More Than Anything

This emerging metaverse will never be widely adopted if global networks aren't fast enough to keep the user experience exciting and engrossing. If the party is too slow and choppy, users will bail out in droves.

Nowadays, even the most popular communal gaming experiences are limited by how many users can join and play at any given time, in part, because of network limitations.

That means the metaverse will need significantly faster global networks to meet its potential.

The world is in the middle of a high-stakes expansion of that capacity right now. Global 5G network infrastructure revenue is on pace to grow 39% to total $19.1 billion in 2021; that's up from $13.7 billion in 2020. Spending is expected to reach 23.25 billion in 2022, according to the latest forecast by Gartner Inc.

That makes Marvell Technology Inc. (Nasdaq: MRVL) a must-own stock right now. The company is practically a one-stop shop for data centers, offering most or all of the hardware needed for a data center - ultra-high-performance chips, networked "hyperscale" storage, and a lot more.

The market is taking notice. The stock is up 15% since last week when, as stocks were taking a pounding all over, Marvell announced better-than-expected Q4 guidance on top of stellar Q3 results.

Over the last three months, earnings came in at $0.43 per share on revenue of $1.21 billion, which easily topped analyst estimates of $0.38 per share on revenue of $1.15 billion.

Driving the Q3 numbers was the company's data center business, which represented 41% of total quarterly revenue and grew 15% sequentially and 109% year over year.

Looking ahead to the next year, EPS was guided in a range of $0.45 to $0.51 on revenue of approximately $1.32 billion. This is compared with estimates for EPS of $0.42 on revenue of $1.21 billion.

The company also expects its 5G operations to increase 30% sequentially and its data center business to grow in the double digits.

I like everything about those numbers. Not only are they strong on their own, but they're also backed up by two of the strongest growth opportunities in the global IT space.

Now, Marvell has had a deservedly good few trading sessions, so by all means, wet your beak at $83. But this is a stock I like owning for the long term, as the metaverse becomes a reality, so I'm looking to own it at lower levels, too.

If MRVL trades down to $77.50 by Dec. 17, 2021, I like buying the MRVL Feb. 18, 2022 $77.50/$80 call spread for $1.20 or less. Plan on closing and selling that call spread for a 100% profit, or if shares of MRVL close below $70.50.