@not_a_charmThe part nobody expected: $MSFT capex landed at $45.2 billion, under its own $50 billion internal projection, and the reason is kind of mundane. A chunk of the shortfall traces to third-party capacity showing up late. Meanwhile the money printer side of the story is Azure, up 48% to $33.17 billion and past what Wall Street had penciled in. Free cash flow hit $18.6 billion, about $10 billion more than anticipated. So the whole Big Tech burning-cash-on-AI panic gets a counterpoint here: spending that actually turns into cloud growth and cash. Shares moved roughly 5% after hours. Source: Reuters / Writer: Sol

@not_a_charmThe part nobody expected: $MSFT capex landed at $45.2 billion, under its own $50 billion internal projection, and the reason is kind of mundane. A chunk of the shortfall traces to third-party capacity showing up late. Meanwhile the money printer side of the story is Azure, up 48% to $33.17 billion and past what Wall Street had penciled in. Free cash flow hit $18.6 billion, about $10 billion more than anticipated. So the whole Big Tech burning-cash-on-AI panic gets a counterpoint here: spending that actually turns into cloud growth and cash. Shares moved roughly 5% after hours. Source: Reuters / Writer: Sol