REDMOND (dpa-AFX) - Microsoft (MSFT) reported a strong fourth-quarter results on Tuesday, primarily powered by a 30% growth in the commercial cloud revenues. Both the earnings and revenues trumped Street estimates.
Net income for the fourth quarter was $16.5 billion or $2.17 earnings per share, up from $11.2 billion or $1.46 per share in the same quarter last year. Twenty-six analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected earnings of $1.90 per share for the quarter.
Microsoft said its fourth-quarter revenues grew 21% to $46.2 billion from $38.03 billion last year. Twenty-four analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $44.1 billion.
One of the primary driving factors for the results was the growth in the cloud business. Due to the pandemic, the entire world shifted to a work-from-home ecosystem, pushing the sale of cloud services for the company. The revenue from intelligent cloud services increased to $17.4 billion in the quarter, up 30% from $13.4 billion last year.
Among other segments, LinkedIn Marketing Solutions jumped 97% in the quarter while LinkedIn itself grew 46% in the market chiefly driven by a worldwide search for jobs.
'As we closed out the fiscal year, our sales teams and partners delivered a strong quarter with over 20 % top and bottom-line growth, highlighted by commercial bookings growth of 30% year over year,' said Amy Hood, executive vice president and CFO of the company. 'Our commercial cloud revenue grew 36% year over year to $19.5 billion,' added Hood.
Post results, the company has dropped to $279.83, down $6.71 or 2.34%. The stock closed regular trading at $286.54 on the market, down $2.51 or 0.87%.
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