Microsoft Shares Weaker in Pre-market; Apple, FB Earnings

A day after Microsoft’s (NASDAQ: MSFT) companies’ March quarter results, its shares were trading weaker on Wednesday’s pre-market. Many traders and shareholders found it daunting since its stocks have risen over 70% even since the pandemic started, despite it having a trillion-dollar valuation. 

It traded over 45 times its 2020 earnings. It is a multiple which is more associated and found with fast, competitive, and becoming increasingly popular starter-ups and smaller businesses. 

Nonetheless, the results showed immense growth in the company’s wide array of businesses. These include its Windows segments, LinkedIn, Xbox, Surface, Search, even its cloud services. Thanks to the millions or billions of supporters, consumers, share-and stockholders. 

These (results) came on the day when Microsoft’s business rival Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOGL) showed a 34% revenue gain. That was to its $55.31 billion-dollar value coming solely from its advertising business, which, surprisingly, Microsoft does not have. 

Microsoft’s revenue in the quarter through March boasts $41.7 billion, which had risen 19% in the same quarter period in 2020. Noticeably, Xbox’s revenue growth shone through at a whopping 34%, with LinkedIn revenues coming in second at 25%. 

Its cloud services and server product revenues rose by 26% during the quarter, driven by Azure’s growth. Furthermore, the advertising revenues for online jobs and social media platforms peaked at $3 billion for the whole year.

Other Big Techs: Apple, Facebook Earnings

U.S. stocks opened mixed, as market participants were largely content to await the day’s big news before making new bets in the market.

Dow Jones futures were lower by 57 points or 0.2% by 6:30 AM ET (1030 GMT). The S&P 500 futures added less than 0.1%. Moreover, Nasdaq 100 futures lost 0.2%, due partly to a 2.2% drop in Microsoft stock.

Again, Big Tech dominates the day’s earnings roster with both Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) and Facebook (NASDAQ: F.B.) due to report after the closing bell. 

Also updating will be Boeing (NYSE: B.A.) and Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM). Their guidance casts fresh light on the state of the air travel recovery and the global chip shortage.

Meanwhile, in other economic news, the Dow and the Nasdaq opened lower on Wednesday after a mixed bag of earnings from big technology firms. Moreover, downbeat Boeing (NYSE: B.A.) results. Investors hoped that the Federal Reserve would stick to its promise of keeping monetary policy loose.