Microsoft Braces for October 28 Earnings With Analysts Racing to Raise Targets
Published on 10/16/2026 at 04:10 | Editorial boerse-global.de
Microsoft heads into its next quarterly report on October 28 with fresh analyst backing, a brewing immigration fight in Washington, and an ambitious in-house chip roadmap all competing for investor attention.
Shares changed hands at EUR 481.05 on Thursday, leaving the stock roughly 2.3% shy of its 52-week peak. The equity has spent recent weeks consolidating just below record territory, with the 52-week high standing at EUR 492.40.
UBS and Mizuho Lift Their Marks
The most aggressive revision came from UBS, which on Wednesday raised its price target to USD 675 from USD 525 while reaffirming a buy rating. The Swiss bank pointed to fundamental momentum in the Azure cloud platform and Microsoft 365, both of which stand to benefit from sustained demand for artificial intelligence.
Mizuho followed suit the same day, lifting its target to USD 600 from USD 510 and keeping an outperform rating. Other market watchers also nudged their estimates higher, citing persistently heavy utilization of cloud infrastructure.
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That optimism rests on Microsoft's entrenched position in the global AI landscape. Investors now await the month-end report for hard evidence on how quickly AI-related spending is converting into revenue.
Maia 300 Targets Multi-Gigawatt Scale
Beyond software, management is pressing ahead with its own data center silicon. Earlier this week the company said it will scale its Azure Maia chip family to multi-gigawatt installations beginning in 2027, with production of the Maia 300 processor slated for the same window.
According to company figures, the Maia 300 is expected to deliver roughly 40% more tokens per megawatt than leading GPU-based systems. The move signals a push to reduce reliance on outside chip suppliers and to bring down the operating cost of AI workloads over the long haul.
Separately, a regulatory filing disclosed that CFO Amy Hood sold 7,305 shares under a trading plan adopted on June 10, 2026, in line with Rule 10b5-1. Such prearranged programs let executives execute sales automatically, independent of short-term price swings.
Smith Pushes Back on H-1B Criticism
On the policy front, Microsoft President Brad Smith went on the offensive over work permits for foreign specialists, warning that tighter permanent residency rules would inflict lasting damage on the U.S. technology sector. He rejected as unfounded accusations from Vice President JD Vance that the company misuses the H-1B visa program, including claims that it displaces American workers and underpays foreign staff.
Microsoft counters with its own figures: all employees are compensated under a single system regardless of origin, and the company hired more than 9,000 U.S.-born workers over the past year. New H-1B petitions accounted for just 1% of the total workforce during that period.
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The dispute escalated on October 8, when the U.S. Department of Labor suspended the so-called PERM process for Microsoft, Adobe and six IT services firms. The action blocks new applications for job-based green card certifications and freezes pending cases for now. As of the end of June, Microsoft employed about 121,000 people in the United States, meaning any obstacle to international recruiting lands squarely during a stretch of heavy spending on AI and data centers.
In an interview, Smith cautioned that closing off qualified immigration could stall the entire sector for more than a generation and push top talent abroad, ultimately undermining U.S. prosperity and competitiveness.
Despite the political friction, the stock has held its ground, inching up 0.6% on the day. Whether Azure's cloud growth can sustain its recent pace now becomes the central question when the company reports on October 28.
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