Microsoft beats Wall Street expectations for fourth quarter in a row amid AI boom

Microsoft released its quarterly earnings report on Wednesday after the New York stock market closed, beating Wall Street's expectations for the fourth quarter in a row amid a financial boom for artificial intelligence businesses. The company revealed revenue of 70.07bn and earnings of 3.46 per share. The result exceeded analyst predictions that revenue would grow to 68.42bn, or 10.6% year-over-year, and that earnings-per-share would come in at 3.22. Shares in the tech giant jumped more than 5% in after-hours trading. Analysts viewed the earnings report as a temperature check on Microsoft's artificial intelligence (AI) business, which has announced it will invest around 80bn in this fiscal year alone, though it has also terminated some data center leases in recent months.