Shares of Microsoft rose during after-hours trade after the tech giant beat fiscal first-quarter earnings and revenue estimates, though a slower pace of Azure growth kept a lid on gains.
The company reported earnings per share of $1.14 on revenue of $29.1 billion. Analysts polled by anticipated EPS of $0.96 on revenue of $27.9 billion. That compared to EPS of $0.84 on revenue of $24.54 billion in the same period a year earlier. The company had reported EPS of $1.13 on revenue of $30.09 billion in the previous quarter.
The tech giant's personal computing segment reported revenues of $10.7 billion, 15% above guidance of $9.95-$10.25 billion.
Microsoft’s efforts to compete with Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) in the battle for cloud dominance waned somewhat as Azure, a competitor of Amazon Web Services, generated revenue growth of 76%, slipping from 89% growth seen in the previous quarter. But overall, intelligent cloud revenue topped guidance.
Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) shares gained 3.42% to trade at $105.82 in after-hours trade following the report.
