Key points of Microsoft's Q4 FY2024 financial report:
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Azure growth slows: Azure grew 29% year-over-year, down 2 percentage points sequentially. AI-related revenue accounts for 8%, up 1 percentage point from last quarter, but no significant acceleration in revenue contribution.
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Office business growth flat: Office 365 revenue grew 13%, slowing about 2 percentage points sequentially. Slow progress in promoting AI features like Copilot, difficulty in enterprise user growth.
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Personal computing business still weak: Comparable revenue growth only 2% excluding consolidation effects. Windows OEM revenue grew 4% year-over-year, close to PC shipments, no significant acceleration.
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New enterprise cloud contract value growth slows significantly: From 29% last quarter to 17%, down 12 percentage points sequentially at constant currency.
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Profit growth slows: Overall revenue grew 15% year-over-year, operating profit grew 15% year-over-year, both slowing from previous quarters. Operating profit margin decreased 0.1 percentage point year-over-year for the first time.
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Capital expenditure increases significantly: Capex up 36% sequentially to $19 billion, putting pressure on profit margins.
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Next quarter guidance below expectations: Various indicators generally slightly below market expectations, Azure growth expected to continue declining to 28-29%.
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AI investment increases but revenue contribution not significant: This is the main issue facing Microsoft and the entire AI industry.
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Valuation pressure: 15% profit growth struggles to support current PE ratio of around 30.
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Short-term pullback possible, but mid-term valuation logic unchanged: Long-term growth potential from AI still exists, but difficult to reflect in performance in the short term.
Overall, Microsoft's performance growth is slowing, AI-related business has not yet brought significant revenue growth, but investment continues to increase. This may lead to short-term stock price pressure, but long-term growth prospects remain.