Microsoft stock price surged 15.5% on July 30, 2026, marking the largest single-day market-value increase in stock market history, after the software giant posted fourth-quarter earnings that beat Wall Street expectations and signaled that its massive AI investments are finally paying off.
The company reported fiscal Q4 2026 revenue of $90 billion, beating analyst expectations of $87.62 billion, and adjusted earnings per share of $4.74 versus the expected $4.24. The earnings beat addressed long-standing investor concerns about when Microsoft would demonstrate tangible returns on its multibillion-dollar AI spending.
Azure revenue, Microsoft’s cloud computing service, surpassed $100 billion in annual revenue for the first time and accelerated to 43% growth in the quarter, exceeding analyst expectations of roughly 40%. This acceleration directly reflected strong demand for AI workloads running on Microsoft’s cloud infrastructure.
Microsoft 365 Copilot, the company’s AI assistant integrated into Office applications, crossed 30 million paid seats, accelerating adoption across enterprise customers. The company also raised its forward guidance, signaling confidence in sustained AI-driven growth momentum.
The earnings results represented a turning point for the stock, which had lagged for much of 2026 amid concerns about the pace and scale of AI capital expenditure. Prior to the earnings announcement, Microsoft posted a record $450 billion single-day market-cap gain, underscoring the magnitude of investor relief and renewed confidence.
Goldman Sachs responded to the earnings by reiterating its Buy rating and raising its 12-month price target to $640 from $610. The bank projects that Microsoft’s earnings-per-share growth will accelerate from roughly 12% in fiscal 2027 to over 20% by fiscal 2029 as Copilot adoption scales and AI revenue streams mature.
The earnings beat follows a similar pattern seen in other big-tech companies reporting strong AI-driven results. Amazon stock surged 15% after Q2 earnings beat on AWS growth, demonstrating that cloud and AI infrastructure providers are capturing significant value from enterprise AI adoption. Microsoft’s results provide concrete evidence that the company’s $41 billion quarterly capital expenditure—spent on AI infrastructure, data centers, and computing capacity—is generating measurable revenue and customer demand.
Microsoft Cloud revenue reached $59.3 billion in Q4, up 27% year-over-year, and the company’s remaining performance obligations—contracts it must still deliver on—jumped 84% to $678 billion. This metric signals strong future revenue visibility and sustained customer commitment to Microsoft’s AI and cloud services.
Sources
- Yahoo Finance — Microsoft stock surge details, Q4 earnings metrics, and market-value gain record
- CNBC — Q4 fiscal 2026 earnings per share, revenue, and analyst expectations
- Reuters — Microsoft market capitalization record and stock price movement
- Barron’s — Goldman Sachs analyst outlook and price target raise following Q4 earnings
- Microsoft Investor Relations — Official Q4 2026 earnings announcement and financial metrics
- 24/7 Wall St. — Goldman Sachs projection on EPS growth acceleration through fiscal 2029
