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Intel’s Data Center Surge Rewrites the Story
10:05 am
By Matt Frankel, CFP®
Team Hidden Gems
Intel (INTC 2.58%) just delivered the kind of quarter that rewrites the narrative on a struggling business. Adjusted EPS of $0.29 obliterated the $0.01 Wall Street consensus, while revenue of $13.6 billion grew 7% year over year and topped expectations by more than $1 billion. The standout engine was the Data Center and AI segment, where revenue jumped 22% to $5.1 billion as hyperscalers raced to buy server CPUs to support “agentic AI” workloads, the kind that orchestrate tasks alongside graphics chips. That demand showed up in margins too, with non-GAAP gross margin expanding to 41% thanks to better pricing, favorable mix, and improved 18A manufacturing yields, the latter referring to Intel’s most advanced chip production process.
The picture isn’t uniformly clean, though.
Amazon’s Record Quarter Can’t Escape Capex Cloud
10:00 am — AMZN -0.6%
By Emily Flippen, CFA
Team Rule Breakers
Amazon (AMZN 1.62%) just reported one of the strongest quarters in its history, but investors are still stuck asking the same question we’ve been asking all year: when does all this spending truly start to pay off?
The headline numbers were — as expected — fantastic. Revenue came in well above expectations, growing 17% year over year. Operating income saw record margins (north of 13%), with AWS growing 28% year-over-year, which is that segment’s fastest growth rate in 15 quarters. Moreover, its $2 billion sequential revenue jump from the fourth quarter was the biggest increase from the fourth to first quarter in AWS’s history.
Success wasn’t just on the cloud side, though; Amazon’s stores business saw 15% unit growth, its own best since the end of COVID lockdowns, and Amazon’s burgeoning advertising business grew a whopping 24%. By almost every count, this was a stellar quarter. And yet shares initially slid around 3% after hours before recovering.
Opening Bell
9:35 am — CAT +7.2%, AMZN +2.0%, META -9.2%, MSFT -2.6%
The market is showing resilience this Thursday as the major indexes climb, fueled by a stellar earnings season. Caterpillar (CAT +9.63%) and Amazon (AMZN 1.62%) are providing the heavy lifting, with the former jumping 7% on robust quarterly figures and the latter climbing as much as 4% following a “blockbuster” report. However, it isn’t all sunshine in Big Tech; Meta Platforms (META 9.73%) plummeted 7% due to weak user growth, while Microsoft (MSFT 5.25%) slipped as AI-related capital expenditures are projected to hit $190 billion.
Amazon’s Cloud Boom Justifies the Spend
9:05 am
By Matt Frankel, CFP®
Team Hidden Gems
Amazon (AMZN 1.62%) just delivered the kind of beat that resets expectations on a slowing growth narrative. Revenue climbed 17% year over year to $181.5 billion, beating consensus by more than $4 billion, while EPS of $2.78 nearly doubled the $1.64 analysts had penciled in. The headline driver was Amazon Web Services, the cloud computing division, which grew 28% to $37.6 billion. That marks its fastest growth pace in roughly four years and reverses the deceleration that had worried investors last quarter. Advertising added another tailwind, growing 24% to $17.2 billion as Amazon scaled new AI-driven ad tools and broadened partnerships with Netflix and others.
The catch shows up in cash flow.
Pershing Square USA Opens 18% Below IPO Price
7:45 am — PSUS +1.34% in pre-market trading
Billionaire Bill Ackman’s highly anticipated Pershing Square USA faced a rough start on the New York Stock Exchange, opening at $41–roughly 18% below its $50 IPO price. The $5 billion closed-end fund launch attempted to entice investors with a unique “sweetener,” granting one share of the parent asset manager, Pershing Square, for every five shares of PSUS purchased. However, the market quickly applied a steep discount to both entities, with PS shares also falling 25% shortly after they began trading. The lackluster debut reflects immediate investor skepticism regarding the closed-end structure, which often sees shares trade at a discount to their underlying net asset value.
- Structural Headwinds: Unlike open-ended mutual funds, PSUS’s closed-end format means its price is dictated by market demand rather than asset value, a dynamic that triggered an instant sell-off.
- The Permanent Capital Play: Despite the rocky start, the $5 billion raise provides Ackman with a massive pool of capital to execute concentrated activist bets without the threat of investor redemptions.
This Morning’s Breakfast News
7:30 am — GOOG +5.94% in pre-market trading
Alphabet (GOOG +4.96%) soared over 7% ahead of the market open thanks to quarterly results easily beating market expectations, with AI demand evident from Cloud revenue jumping 63% year over year and net income rising 81% over the same period.
- “In summary, a terrific start to the year”: CEO Sundar Pichai explained investments in AI were paying off, with the “full-stack approach” driving performance. Adoption of the Gemini app saw the strongest ever quarter for consumer subscription AI plans.
- “Investors have every reason to be bullish”: Fool analyst Sanmeet Deo commented “these results prove that Alphabet’s massive AI investments are translating into tangible, spectacular financial returns,” with the business being “perfectly positioned to dominate the AI revolution while actively rewarding its shareholders.”
Alphabet’s AI Boom Drives Record Q1 Gain
5:45 am — GOOG +6.10% in pre-market trading
By Sanmeet Deo
Team Rule Breakers
Alphabet‘s (GOOG +4.96%) stock has doubled over the past year, squashing rumors of its demise and concerns over its position in the AI race. While AI models have frequently been trading the pole position after every new version release, Alphabet is showing its AI initiatives are flowing through its entire business.
Alphabet delivered a blockbuster Q1 2026, completely crushing expectations. Consolidated revenues reached $109.9 billion, representing a massive 22% year-over-year increase. This was the first 20%+ revenue growth quarter since Q1 2022! Profitability exploded alongside top-line growth, with net income jumping 81% and earnings per share surging 82% to $5.11. The undeniable star of the quarter was Google Cloud, which saw revenues accelerate 63% to cross the $20 billion threshold for the very first time.
These results prove that Alphabet’s massive AI investments are translating into tangible, spectacular financial returns. Google Cloud’s backlog nearly doubled quarter over quarter to over $460 billion, driven by surging enterprise AI demand.
ICYMI: Wednesday’s Scoreboard
5:15 am — CRWD -0.75% in pre-market trading
CrowdStrike (CRWD 3.09%) was the subject of the latest Scoreboard video.
Microsoft AI Hits $37B Annual Run Rate
5:00 am — MSFT +0.34% in pre-market trading
By Seth Jayson
Team Rule Breakers
Microsoft (MSFT 5.25%) just reported a quarter that beat on basically every number that matters, and the stock still dropped after hours. Such is the state of AI enthusiasm, where some companies are ripping, and some draw yawns despite really hauling the mail.
Azure grew 40%, better than anyone expected, and revenue hit $82.9 billion. Word is the AI business is now running at a $37 billion annual pace, up 123% year over year. And yet: down 3% after hours. That’s the strange place Microsoft occupies right now. The company is executing well by almost any measure, but investors are doing the math on $130 billion in annual infrastructure spending and aiming a very hairy eyeball at a Copilot adoption rate that’s still hovering around 3% of its enormous user base. (I get it. I use Copilot on windows, and every time I do, I’m sorry.)
Today’s Change
(-5.25%) $-22.27
Current Price
$402.19
Key Data Points
Market Cap
$3.2T
Day’s Range
$400.15 – $414.42
52wk Range
$356.28 – $555.45
Volume
1.1M
Avg Vol
36M
Gross Margin
68.59%
Dividend Yield
0.82%
Meta “Continues to Get More Attractive on Weakness”
4:15 am — META -7.01% in pre-market trading
By Sanmeet Deo
Team Rule Breakers
Meta (META 9.73%) just dropped a monster Q1 2026, posting $56.31 billion in revenue, which is up 33% year over year. Earnings per share (EPS) crushed expectations at $10.44. The company also teased its highly anticipated first model from “Meta Superintelligence Labs”.
Meta’s advertising machine is absolutely printing money! Ad impressions jumped 19% and the average price per ad climbed 12%. However, don’t let the shiny $10.44 EPS fool you; an $8.03 billion one-time tax benefit massively inflated that bottom-line number. Also, daily active people (DAP) saw a rare sequential dip to 3.56 billion, blamed on internet disruptions in Iran and blocked WhatsApp access in Russia.
Meta issued solid Q2 revenue guidance of $58 billion to $61 billion, but management is also opening the wallet much wider. On the bullish case, Meta is firing on all cylinders with surging ad demand and pricing power. Its pivot toward “personal superintelligence” keeps the long-term growth story incredibly exciting.
Today’s Change
(-9.73%) $-65.14
Current Price
$603.98
Key Data Points
Market Cap
$1.7T
Day’s Range
$600.00 – $620.62
52wk Range
$520.26 – $796.25
Volume
1.3M
Avg Vol
15M
Gross Margin
82.00%
Dividend Yield
0.31%
Before the Opening Bell
4:00 am
Wall Street is processing a volatile Thursday morning as surging oil prices and a mixed “Magnificent Seven” report card rattle investor confidence. Brent crude soared past $125 per barrel–a wartime high–after President Trump signaled a long-term naval blockade against Iran until a new nuclear deal is reached. While Alphabet (GOOG +4.96%) provided a rare bright spot with solid sales, peers Meta (META 9.73%) and Microsoft (MSFT 5.25%) saw shares retreat as investors questioned the high price tag of their AI infrastructure. All eyes now shift to Apple (AAPL +0.73%), which reports after today’s close, with shareholders seeking clarity on how the iPhone maker plans to monetize its own artificial intelligence roadmap.
- Energy Shock Contagion: Persistent disruptions in the Strait of Hormuz are driving global inflation fears, complicating the outlook for further rate cuts from the Federal Reserve.
- The AI Expenditure Filter: Markets are no longer rewarding high-tech companies for simply investing in AI; they are actively punishing those that cannot demonstrate immediate, scalable revenue from that spending.