By Yasin Ebrahim
Investing.com - Microsoft rallied in after-hours trading Tuesday after reporting first-quarter earnings and revenue that beat consensus estimates, led by strength in its fast-growing cloud business as the trend to digitization gathers pace.
Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) shares gained 4.5% in after-hours trade following the report.
The company announced earnings per share of $2.03 on revenue of $43.08 billion. Analysts polled by Investing.com anticipated EPS of $1.64 on revenue of $40.23 billion.
Revenue in productivity and business processes was up 13% to $13.4 billion and its intelligent cloud business, which includes cloud business Azure, grew 23% to $13.4 billion.
Azure grew 50% in the quarter, up from a growth rate of 47% in the third quarter of last year.
“Accelerating demand for our differentiated offerings drove commercial cloud revenue to $16.7 billion, up 34% year over year,” said Amy Hood, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Microsoft. “We continue to benefit from our investments in strategic, high-growth areas," the company said.
Microsoft said it would provide forward-looking guidance on its earnings conference call and webcast.
"MSFT is continuing to expand its market share into new areas of the digital economy, such as cloud-computing, while maintaining its leading position with legacy software products such as Windows and Office. This durable advantage is helping the company achieve sustained, double-digit growth in revenue, earnings per share and free cash flow, making it a reliable tech stock to own over the long term," Investing.com Analyst Haris Anwar said.
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