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For Microsoft (MSFT), its revenue in the fourth fiscal quarter of fiscal year 2025 reached USD 76.44 billion, a year-on-year increase of 18%, significantly higher than the market expectation of USD 73.8 billion; net profit stood at USD 27.333 billion, a year-on-year increase of 24%. The performance growth was mainly driven by its intelligent cloud business, with Azure and other cloud services revenue growing by 39%—the highest growth rate in two and a half years. Driven by this, server products and cloud services revenue increased by 27%. In addition, Microsoft disclosed for the first time that Azure's annual revenue exceeded USD 75 billion, a year-on-year increase of 34%. After the earnings report was released, Microsoft's stock price surged 8% in after-hours trading, becoming the second company with a market value exceeding USD 4 trillion after NVIDIA (NVDA).

Meta (META) also delivered strong results. Its second-quarter revenue was USD 47.52 billion, a year-on-year increase of 22%, higher than the market expectation of USD 44.8 billion; net profit reached USD 18.34 billion, a year-on-year surge of 36%. Meta attributed performance improvement to efficiency gains from AI in its ad system, which drove a 9% increase in average advertising prices. After the earnings report was released, Meta's stock price soared more than 11% in pre-market trading.

In the early morning of August 1, Apple (AAPL) and Amazon (AMZN) also released their earnings reports one after another. In the third fiscal quarter of fiscal year 2025, ending June 28, Apple's total revenue was USD 94.04 billion, a year-on-year increase of 10%, the largest increase since December 2021; net profit was USD 24.43 billion, a year-on-year increase of 9%. Revenue from the core iPhone business was USD 44.58 billion, a year-on-year increase of 13%, far higher than the market expectation of USD 40.22 billion; revenue from the Mac business was USD 8.05 billion, a year-on-year increase of nearly 15%, performing impressively. Notably, Apple's revenue in the Greater China region rebounded, with total revenue from the region reaching USD 15.37 billion in the quarter, a year-on-year increase of 4%, reversing the declines of 2% and 11% in the previous two quarters, respectively. Cook said that consumer subsidies in some parts of China had significantly boosted sales of the company's products. After the earnings report was announced, Apple's stock price rose more than 3% in after-hours trading.

Amazon's second-quarter revenue and profits also exceeded market expectations. In the quarter, its net sales reached USD 167.7 billion, up 13% year-on-year; net profit rose to USD 18.2 billion from USD 13.5 billion in the same period last year, a year-on-year increase of 35%. The North America segment and International segment delivered outstanding performances, with operating profits surging 48% and 448% respectively, demonstrating Amazon's ability to withstand risks amid the complex environment in the second quarter, such as escalating uncertainties in global trade policies and tariff impacts. However, its AWS business underperformed expectations, with an operating profit of USD 10.2 billion, lower than the market forecast of USD 10.9 billion; the profit margin stood at 32.9%, down from 39.5% in the first quarter of this year and 35.5% in the same period last year. The slowdown in the growth of AWS, the cloud business, which also lags behind competitors like Microsoft and Google, has triggered market concerns, leading to a more than 7% drop in Amazon's stock price in after-hours trading.

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