Microsoft stock wipes $124 billion in a day despite double earnings beat
Microsoft stock price one-day chart. Source: GoogleHow the AI boom led to Microsoft erasing $124 billion in a day Such performance is most likely linked to Microsoft following the trend of increasing capital expenditure (CapEx) to further the development of artificial intelligence (AI) technology and infrastructure, with the result of diminishing free cash flow almost uniformly triggering investor anxiety. In the case of the company behind , Q3 CapEx and finance leases amounted to $31.9 billion, while gross margins fell, at 67.6%, to their lowest percentage since 2022. Free cash flow margin likewise diminished compared to the same period one year earlier, dropping from 29% to 19.1%. Notably, the 3.93% decrease in AI expenditure is in line with an overall trend in 2026, though the late April losses were significantly smaller than the previous $360 billion daily wipe that came after the revelation that as much as 45% of Microsofts backlog was tied to OpenAI. Why Microsoft stock will likely rally in May Elsewhere, it appears unlikely that MSFT stock‘s latest drop will prove sticky, considering the firm’s other reported figures were overall strong. The blue-chip technology giant, for example, offered a double beat in terms of revenue and earnings per share (EPS). Indeed, the firms