$MSFT with a strong double beat in Q4. The stock is down 6% despite the strong results due to heavy spending.
Microsoft delivered impressive headline numbers, with revenue jumping 17% to $81.3 billion and Azure cloud growth accelerating to 39%, driven by fierce AI demand. The Intelligent Cloud segment is now a massive engine, crossing $32.9 billion in sales. However, capital expenditure nearly doubled to ~$30 billion, raising fears about cash burn. Second, the massive 60% profit jump can be misleading as it includes a $7.6 billion paper gain from the OpenAI investment. Stripping that out, real profit growth was much lower, leaving investors worried that the costs of the AI boom are rising faster than the immediate cash returns. 🔹 EPS: $4.14 vs. $3.91 est. ✅ 🔹 Revenue: $81.27B vs. $80.31B est. ✅ Key takeaways: 🔸 Intelligent Cloud rev: +29% YoY 🔸 Productivity rev: +16% YoY 🔸 Computing rev: -3% YoY 🔸 MSFT Cloud rev: +26% YoY 🔸 Azure/Cloud: +39% YoY Source: KaizenInvestor @Kaizen_Investor Barchart
South Korea is going to allow 2x single stock ETFs.
This is an effort to bring in more retail money which is largely in US stocks. This comes after the government said you have to take a training course... Source: Eric Balchunas, Bloomberg
It looks like negative interest rates are returning to Switzerland...
Government bonds with maturities of up to 4 years are now yielding negative returns. Source: HolgerZ, Bloomberg
Uranium on fire as it jumps to highest price since May 2024
Source: Barchart
Tether owns 3X more gold than bitcoin.
Gold: Tether holds ~140 tons = $24B Bitcoin: Tether holds $8B in Bitcoin Source: Marin Katusa @MarinKatusa
China only has one Silver fund and the demand is so rampant it had to shut off subscriptions so it's now at 42% premium
Source: Eric Balchunas @EricBalchunas Bloomberg
Cyclicals keep outperforming defensives...
The message from the market on the macro cycle sems pretty clear Source: Bloomberg
At the high end of its capex forecast ($135BN), META free cash flow in 2026 will be $0
Source: zerohedge
