Amazon’s $400 Billion Rally Hinges on Cloud Results: Tech Watch
- Alphabet, Microsoft send conflicting signals on cloud services
- Amazon Web Services accounts for the bulk of Amazon’s profits
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Amazon.com Inc.’s run as one of the best stocks this year will likely come down to the performance of a single business line: cloud computing.
That’s the lesson, at least, from the results delivered by Alphabet Inc. and Microsoft Corp. this week. The Windows software maker rode its Azure cloud-services business to a 3.1% gain on Wednesday, which it reversed Thursday in early trading, while Google’s parent suffered its biggest stock drop in more than three years after cloud sales marred otherwise strong results. Amazon sank 5.6% in a broad tech rout Wednesday and was down about 1.6% on Thursday ahead of its earnings due after markets close.