Satya Nadella's Microsoft Stock Jumped 18% in a Week After Azure's Annual Revenue Topped $100 Billion for the First Time. Is It Still a Buy?
Key Points
Microsoft Azure's cloud revenue jumped to $100 billion after the company invested heavily in AI infrastructure.
Microsoft's shares are still relatively cheap, and the company's free cash flow is in good shape, even with a ramp-up in capex spending.
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Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) pulled off what some of its peers haven't achieved lately: It converted massive artificial intelligence spending into impressive AI revenue.
The company recently reported that its Azure cloud business topped $100 billion in annual sales for the first time, outpacing expectations and boosting investor optimism that Microsoft's AI strategy is a success. Its shares popped 18% in just a week and are up about 29% over the past month.
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Here's why Microsoft stock is still a buy.
Image source: Getty Images.
Why investors were so excited
Investors have been skeptical that tech giants like Microsoft, Meta Platforms, Alphabet, and others are spending too much on artificial intelligence infrastructure, with little to show for it. That's why they were pleasantly surprised when Microsoft reported $100 billion in Azure cloud revenue for the full 2026 fiscal year, a significant 41% jump from 2025.
Microsoft sells access to its Azure cloud and AI services to other companies and is the second-largest cloud player behind Amazon. To stay competitive in the AI age, all of the major cloud providers are investing hundreds of billions of dollars to build AI infrastructure. For example, Microsoft spent $175 billion (adjusted from $190 billion, due to an accounting change) in capital expenditures (capex) for fiscal 2026, and tech companies will spend an estimated $750 billion this year on AI capex.
That's a sizable sum, and for many of Microsoft's peers, high capex has led to lower free cash flow. Alphabet's free cash flow fell to negative $5.9 billion in its most recent quarter, down from a positive free cash flow of about $25 billion in the year-ago quarter. And Meta's free cash flow fell 91% to only $784 million in Q2 2026.
Meanwhile, Microsoft declined just 23% and still had a positive free cash flow of $19.6 billion in its fiscal Q4 of 2026. That's exactly the financial stability that AI investors are looking for right now. They want to see tech companies invest in AI, but in a way that actually drives the company forward.
Why Microsoft stock is still a buy
Even with its recent share price gains, Microsoft is still relatively inexpensive. The company's stock has a trailing price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of just 28, which is significantly below the technology sector P/E average of 35.
That makes Microsoft stock a good deal right now. But the stock isn't a buy just because it's cheap. It's also the fact that Microsoft has demonstrated it can make major investments in artificial intelligence and will actually generate revenue for the company without obliterating its free cash flow.
As tech companies continue to spend money hand over fist to win the AI race, Microsoft just laid out the playbook for how to succeed with AI -- and investors are taking notice.
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Chris Neiger has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Alphabet, Amazon, Meta Platforms, and Microsoft. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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