Fast Money Blog- 1/30/26
Earnings season started with a bang this week, with META, MSFT, AAPL and V releasing their earnings data.
Meta Platforms, Inc. (META) came out with strong earnings for Q4 2025, reporting top-line quarterly revenue of $59.9 billion, up 24% year-over-year, driven mostly by online ads.
The company also provided its 2026 capital expenditures guidance, saying it anticipates spending between $115 billion and $135 billion, nearly twice the amount Meta spent on capex in 2025.
As members of the public, we don’t know what the ultimate effects of AI will be in the next 52 weeks, but the amount of money being put into it is astounding.
Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) released its Q2 2026 earnings, with top-line revenue of $81.27 billion, up 17% year-over-year.
Moreover, Microsoft’s profits were $38.5 billion, up 60% year-over-year,
Microsoft cloud quarterly revenue was $51.5 billion, up 26% year-over-year, marking the first time this segment crossed $50 billion.
The Productivity and Business Processes segment, which includes LinkedIn and the Office suite of products, brought in $34.1 billion, an increase of 16% year-over-year.
These earnings were absolutely outstanding. A stock selling off after amazing news is something we have seen before.
On Thursday, January 29th, Visa reported solid Q1 2026 earnings, with top-line revenue of $10.9 billion, up 15% year-over-year. Consumer spending remained resilient and the holiday season was strong.
Here’s what you need to know about Q1:
Total payments volume increased 9% year-over-year
Total Processed Transactions increased 9% year-over-year, to 69.4 billion.
Cross-border volume jumped 11% from last year.
Quarterly service revenue was $4.8 billion, an increase of 13% year-over-year. This segment includes loyalty programs, advanced security measures like fraud prevention, and personalized offers.
Although this was another great quarter for Dow component Visa, credit card processor companies have seen a drop in their stock price due to intense regulatory pressure, specifically a recent push by President Trump for a 10% cap on credit card interest rates.
Apple also posted their Q1 2026 earnings with record breaking quarterly top-line revenue of $143.8 billion, up 16% year-over-year, mostly due to the staggering demand of the iPhone 17, particularly in China.
The company did well in just about every sector, particularly with iPhones and their Service sector.
iPhone revenue was $85.3 billion, up 23% year-over-year.
The Services sector, which includes sales generated by the App Store, Apple TV, Apple Music, Apple Pay, AppleCare, iCloud and advertising, posted record quarterly revenue of $30 billion, up 14% year-over-year.
In other news, the company also confirmed that its AI assistant, Siri, will be powered by Google's Gemini and will launch later this year.
While Apple forecasts a strong 2026, the company did say that supply constraints are limiting their ability to meet demand, primarily for iPhone and AirPods, which clearly worried investors who did not drive the stock price up in spite of record breaking revenue.
Nonetheless, Apple has a loyal customer base driving sales, and it looks as if that will continue.
These 4 companies are clearly the leaders in their field and great investments. I expect their 2026 revenue to continue to impress.
Take a look at the 5 year range of their stock prices:
5 years ago META stock was trading at $259 per share. Today it closed at $716.50 per share.
5 years ago Microsoft stock was trading at $235 per share. Today it closed at $430.29 per share.
5 years ago Visa stock was trading at $195.14 per share. Today it closed at $322.34 per share.
5 years ago Apple stock was trading at $133.75 per share. Today it closed at $259.48 per share.
Tyrone Jackson
The Wealthy Investor