Nasdaq MSFT MicroSoft

Wall Street's main indexes were mixed on Friday as investors digested hot inflation data that caused a sharp selloff in the previous session on fears about quicker interest rate hikes.

Looking today at week-over-week shares outstanding changes among the universe of ETFs covered at ETF Channel, one standout is the WisdomTree U.S. Quality Dividend Growth Fund (Symbol: DGRW) where we have detected an approximate $170.9 million dollar inflow -- that's a 2.5% incr

Looking at units outstanding versus one week prior within the universe of ETFs covered at ETF Channel, the biggest outflow was seen in the SPDR S&P 500 ETF Trust, where 8,850,000 units were destroyed, or a 1.0% decrease week over week. Among the largest underlying componen

U.S. stocks ended sharply lower on Thursday after key inflation data showed a faster-in-expected rise in consumer prices, while the 10-year Treasury yield rose after a Fed official’s comments indicated that the central bank would aggressively hike rates to combat inflatio

Inflation is running at its highest level in over three decades, and it looks like it might stay elevated for longer than most experts had expected. In this Fool Live video clip, recorded on Jan. 27, Fool.com contributors Matt Frankel, Travis Hoium, Rick Munarriz, and Jose Najarr

While there's still debate about what the metaverse will or could be at its full potential, there's no doubt that there's abundant hype and excitement surrounding this virtual universe. In this segment of Backstage Pass, recorded on Jan. 11, Fool contributors Demitri Kalogeropoul

After several years in development, the blockbuster video game series Halo, owned by Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT)'s Xbox Game Studios, is finally going to be a big-budget TV series. The show, also called Halo, is scheduled to begin streaming on the ViacomCBS (NASDAQ: VIAC) service Pa

It's absolutely vital to the success of any business to be near its customers, but for retailers, this statement is doubly true. People put up all kinds of barriers to purchases, so there becomes a sort of silent arms race between potential customers and modern retailers who are

Looking at the underlying holdings of the ETFs in our coverage universe at ETF Channel, we have compared the trading price of each holding against the average analyst 12-month forward target price, and computed the weighted average implied analyst target price for the ETF itsel

[Updated: Feb 8, 2022] Electronic Arts Stock Update

The NASDAQ 100 After Hours Indicator is down -9.45 to 14,696.19. The total After hours volume is currently 116,859,517 shares traded.The following are the most active stocks for the after hours session: Bristol-Myers Squibb Company (BMY) is unchanged at $66.51, with 4,680,372 sh

The much-awaited consumer price index (CPI) reading for January more than lived up to its billing, jumping by the fastest annual rate in four decades. Wall Street ultimately sold off on the news, but only after a few hours of waffling.

Wall Street ended sharply lower on Thursday after U.S. consumer prices data came in hotter than expected and subsequent comments from a Federal Reserve official raised fears the U.S. central bank will hike rates aggressively to fight inflation.

What do cloud computing, digital transformation, productivity, enterprise automation and security all have in common? All are secular growth trends powering Microsoft’s (MSFT) top-line, according to Morgan Stanley’s Keith Weiss.

Couple those mega trends with the “strong operational efficiency driving margin expansion,” and the result is a company that will reach $20+ in EPS in 5 years time.

We are now approaching the mid-cycle phase on the economy’s path to recovery, says Weiss, who believes investors are on the lookout for assets with “strong secular growth drivers, solid pricing power and earnings growth able to well outpace inflation.” Microsoft ticks all the boxes.

Weiss thinks the company’s commercial growth opportunities fall into two broad buckets.

One comes from the “information worker base.” This involves the 400 million employees making use of the Office suite which give the company an audience to “upsell additional user-based functionality.” This includes products for collaboration & communication (Teams), analytics & visualization (PowerBI), endpoint security (Defender) and identity management (Azure AD). “Multiplying the average price points of any of these solutions times 400 million yields a large potential market opportunity,” notes Weiss.

The second bucket involves “leveraging its platform for broader enterprise solutions.” Powering the Intelligence Cloud and the Dynamics 365 offerings are “foundational technologies” such as cloud computing, data management and machine learning, amongst others.

This provides enterprises with a way of constructing - or purchasing - the “next generation of modern applications.”

“Said another way,” Weiss explains, “A platform where thousands of companies can spend 10's of millions of dollars per year.”

Which all position Microsoft to outperform against multiple secular growth trends which Weiss estimates will show a 15% revenue CAGR through CY26.

But it’s not only the top-line which will benefit. As Azure pivots towards “higher value solutions” and the company continues to operate “very efficiently,” Weiss sees room for both gross margins (~50 bps per year) and operating margin expansion (to ~47% in FY27).

Great for Microsoft, then, but what does it all mean for investors? Weiss reiterated an Overweight (i.e. Buy) rating on MSFT along with a $372 price target. If correct, investors could be lining their pockets with ~23% gain. (To watch Weiss’s track record, click here)

There are no Microsoft contrarians on Wall Street. Like Morgan Stanley, all the other 28 reviews are positive, making for a Strong Buy consensus rating. The average price target sits just above Weiss’s, and at $375.22, suggests shares will climb by 21% over the next 12 months. (See Microsoft stock analysis on TipRanks)

To find good ideas for stocks trading at attractive valuations, visit TipRanks’ Best Stocks to Buy, a newly launched tool that unites all of TipRanks’ equity insights.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are solely those of the featured analyst. The content is intended to be used for informational purposes only. It is very important to do your own analysis before making any investment.

Major global stock indexes fell on Thursday under pressure from crucial U.S. inflation data, falling technology shares and rising benchmark bond yields.

Wall Street sank on Thursday after U.S. consumer prices data came in hotter than expected, and subsequent comments from a Federal Reserve official raised fears the U.S. central bank will hike rates aggressively to fight inflation.

Megacap companies dragged U.S. stock indexes lower on Thursday after a hotter consumer prices reading and comments from St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank President James Bullard raised fears the Fed will act aggressively to counter inflation.

Looking at options trading activity among components of the S&P 500 index, there is noteworthy activity today in Microsoft Corporation (Symbol: MSFT), where a total volume of 257,668 contracts has been traded thus far today, a contract volume which is representative of appr

Megacap stocks dragged U.S. stock indexes lower on Thursday after a hotter consumer prices data raised fears the Federal Reserve will act aggressively to counter inflation, while Disney jumped after posting upbeat quarterly results.

Today, February 10, 2022, among the underlying components of the NYSE, we saw unusual or noteworthy options trading volume and activity in Lumen Technologies, Inc (LUMN), which opened at $11.17.