Microsoft shares up by 3.5% after earnings topped analysts' projections

Microsoft reported quarterly sales and earnings that topped analysts’ projections, fuelled by robust growth in cloud-services demand. Shares were up 3.5 per cent in premarket trading. Revenue in the third quarter, which ended March 31, rose 18 per cent to $49.4 billion, the software maker said Tuesday in a statement. Net income rose to $16.7 billion, or $2.22 a share. That compared with average analyst projections for $49 billion in sales and $2.19 a share in earnings, according to a Bloomberg survey.

Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella has built up the company’s two main cloud businesses, Azure and internet-based versions of Office, into steady growth engines that help insulate Microsoft from supply-chain weakness that hurt the availability of PCs and Xbox consoles. Azure — behind only Amazon.com in the market for cloud infrastructure services, computing power and storage delivered via the internet — posted 46 per cent growth, matching the rate in the second quarter and meeting estimates.