Microsoft (MSFT)’s Cloud Comeback: Is Azure Back on Top?

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We recently published a list of

10 Stocks Wall Street is Talking About These Days

. In this article, we are going to take a look at where Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) stands against other stocks Wall Street is talking about these days.

Gene Muster from Deepwater Asset Management said in a recent interview with CNBC that investors should take a “targeted” approach while investing in major tech companies and look for “pockets” of opportunities.

“I think that when you answer the question more holistically, there’s still—if you look at, uh, we looked at 20 different companies, tech companies, and their reporting season and graded each of them—and of the six Mag Seven, five of the six we gave an A grade, and so there’s still this outperformance that you’re seeing with the fundamentals on these companies, but that doesn’t mean that the best opportunities to invest is necessarily with them, and so again, more of a targeted approach.”

Munster also talked about some major tech companies and said he believes Jensen Huang’s AI chip giant is still “cheap” when it comes to its stock price. However, the analyst advised investors to look for smaller companies:

“You have to be uh strategic in terms of what you’re buying. If you wanted to buy a basket, I would buy a basket of smaller tech companies, sub 500 billion dollars, and focus on those. It’s probably where your bigger outperformance is.”

In this article, we selected 10 stocks that are actively trading on Wall Street. For each stock, we included information about how many hedge funds hold them as investments. We focus on these particular stocks because they attract significant interest from hedge funds. This trend interests us due to our findings which indicate that following the leading choices made by successful hedge funds allows us to achieve better returns than the broader market. Each quarter, our monthly publication recommends 14 small-cap and large-cap equities based on their potential for growth; since May 2014, this approach has yielded an impressive return rate of 373.4%, surpassing its reference index by 218 percentage points.

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Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:
MSFT
)



Number of Hedge Fund Investors: 279

Dan Niles from Niles Investment said in a latest program on CNBC that Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)’s results showed the company’s Cloud business has “done well.”

Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ: MSFT) — take note, for the past four quarters, this marks the first instance where Azure, their cloud division, performed impressively. In the previous three quarters, it had been disappointing; however, Azure experienced an acceleration in growth from 31% to 33% YoY. When comparing with Google Cloud or Amazon Web Services—both saw a slowdown in growth by 2%. Additionally, Microsoft Corp (NASDAQ: MSFT), compared to earlier years when they were heavy spenders and increased expenditure rapidly making them the poorest performing among the Magnificent Seven last year, now seems more prudent about managing costs. This could be part of what makes it stand out as the top performer within the group so far this year.

The Mar Vista U.S. Quality Select Strategy provided commentary on Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) as follows:

Q1 2025 investor letter

:


“Microsoft Corporation

(NASDAQ:MSFT) announced robust booking figures, underscored by a rapidly increasing remaining performance obligation totaling almost $300 billion—a significant rise of 36% compared to last year—and also showed steady growth in cloud revenues with a yearly increase of 21%. However, despite these positive indicators, Microsoft’s share price faced downward pressure due to Azure’s revenue growth rate of only 31% annually, which was towards the lower limit of market forecasts. Furthermore, projections for the next quarter suggested Azure’s revenue would grow between 31% and 32%, indicating a deceleration in expansion not tied to artificial intelligence advancements.

We remain confident that Microsoft is poised to increase its market share as businesses of every scale shift towards a digitally-focused strategy and embrace generative AI technologies. Given its robust foothold in corporate environments and its wide array of services covering infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS), platform-as-a-service (PaaS), and software-as-a-service (SaaS), Microsoft stands out as an essential technology supplier for various sectors.

The firm is successfully capitalizing on a large market opportunity through its strategy focused on digital transformation and the integration of advanced AI technologies such as ChatGPT. These initiatives enable companies to enhance their efficiency and cut expenses. As a result, we anticipate that Microsoft’s offerings will stay robust despite tough economic conditions, driving moderate two-figure increases in intrinsic value throughout our investment period.”

Overall, MSFT


ranks 1st


On our current roster of discussed stocks on Wall Street, one stands out among others. Although Microsoft (MSFT) shows significant potential, we firmly believe that lesser-known artificial intelligence stocks present a stronger opportunity for substantial gains over a brief period. An example can be seen with an AI stock that has risen steadily throughout 2025, contrasting sharply against well-known AI equities which have declined roughly 25% during the same timeframe. Should you seek an AI investment alternative to MSFT that boasts a valuation below five times its earnings, consider exploring our detailed analysis on this promising option.

cheapest AI stock


.



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Disclosure: None. This piece was initially published at


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