Microsoft, Meta and Alphabet reported for the quarter

THIS MATERIAL (INFORMATION) IS PRODUCED AND DISTRIBUTED BY THE BELL'S FOREIGN AGENT OR CONCERNES THE ACTIVITIES OF THE BELL'S FOREIGN AGENT. 18+

Bigtech quarterly reporting week continues in the United States. First results:

• Microsoft shares fell 4% in after-hours trading. Overall, the report is strong - revenue grew by 16% to $65.6 billion. However, investors were concerned about the lag of the Azure cloud service from the planned parameters for the physical capacity of data centers for AI, and with increasing costs for them. Azure revenue growth will slow to 31-32% in the current quarter versus 34% in the reporting quarter.
• Meta (recognized as extremist in Russia) has a similar picture - a 3% drop in quotes due to investments in AI. The head of the company, Mark Zuckerberg, pointed to the broad positive effect of the introduction of artificial intelligence in all areas of the company's activities, but it will continue to be financed from advertising revenue. The AI ​​and augmented reality division of Reality Labs suffered a loss of $4.4 billion, with more to come in the next quarter. The fourth-quarter revenue forecast of $45 billion to $48 billion is in line with investor expectations.
• Alphabet, on the other hand, beat expectations on all fronts, including cloud and AI, with its stock up 7%. Revenue increased by 16% to $74.6 billion. Google is actively attracting AI startups with money to cloud hosting and is gradually catching up with the leaders - Amazon and Microsoft. Investors especially liked that Google, over the course of a year and a half, has reduced the cost of AI search results by an order of magnitude “due to breakthroughs in hardware, development and technology.”