
Microsoft reports $22.6B in Q4 revenue - tekheletknight
https://techcrunch.com/2016/07/19/microsofts-q4-earnings-beat-with-22-6b-in-revenue-0-69-eps/
======
julsimon
Not according to GAAP rules...

[http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-07-19/microsoft-misses-
ga...](http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-07-19/microsoft-misses-gaap-revenue-
eps-beats-non-gaap-after-using-lower-tax-rate-stock-so)

~~~
lloyd-christmas
> Not according to GAAP rules...

Not "rules" but "guidelines". Or quite literally, "principles".

"... stock soars"

The thing is that GAAP vs Non-GAAP is pretty irrelevant unless they regularly
change how they do it. If a company reports non-GAAP earnings every quarter
with the same methodology, it's effectively the same as reporting GAAP. People
on wall street aren't dumb. There is a reason the reaction was positive.

Food for thought, here are GAAP vs non-GAAP reportings for the S&P 500
companies: [http://www.auditanalytics.com/blog/wp-
content/uploads/2015/1...](http://www.auditanalytics.com/blog/wp-
content/uploads/2015/11/NonGAAP-Table12.png)

For the non-finance people, this is like using snake case in a camel case
language or vice versa. Sure, it's an annoyance the first time you look at the
project. As long as it's consistent between files, it's not really worth
withdrawing from your "things I can bitch about at the dinner table" account.

~~~
lanevorockz
This belief that Wall Street is always correct is exactly what caused the
previous economic crash. Speculators don't care about a correct investment
decision is about riding the trends. If people are buying, it doesn't matter
if you don't agree .. you have to buy as well it works as a hedge.

btw, don't say " for the non-finance people " -> it's very arrogant and
bankers are already hated as it is.

~~~
lloyd-christmas
> This belief that Wall Street is always correct is exactly what caused the
> previous economic crash.

This is the easy over-simplification that makes for a convenient blame-game.

> Speculators don't care about a correct investment decision is about riding
> the trends

Speculators != Investors.

> If people are buying, it doesn't matter if you don't agree .. you have to
> buy as well it works as a hedge.

No. If other people are buying, you can sit there and do absolutely nothing.

> btw, don't say " for the non-finance people"

No. I'll go ahead and target my explanations to the exact people who may not
understand the topic being discussed. If you feel like you're being looked
down upon, that's your insecurity, not my problem.

~~~
lanevorockz
I forgot Microsoft actions are beyond criticism. Let's buy shares.

~~~
evanws
That's not even remotely what he's saying. Come on dude.

~~~
lanevorockz
Hacker News how far are you sinking ? Is it time to give up on you ?

You can see it's the same person with an alternate login. Social media is
slowly becoming the biggest confirmation bias factory, facts became totally
irrelevant in discussions.

------
heyrhett
"The increase in Microsoft's annual revenue since Google was founded is still
greater than Google's total annual revenue."

[https://twitter.com/patrickc/status/526406718440218624](https://twitter.com/patrickc/status/526406718440218624)

~~~
forgotAgain
That statement was made about 18 months ago. It is no longer true. Microsoft's
revenue in FY 1998 was $14.48 billion as per
[https://news.microsoft.com/1998/07/16/microsoft-posts-
record...](https://news.microsoft.com/1998/07/16/microsoft-posts-record-
revenue-and-income-for-fiscal-1998/) .

Last 12 months rev for G and M are $75 and $85.3 billion per Google finance.

edit: M's revenue had actually decreased $8 billion over the prior 12 months.

------
ProfChronos
It is weird to see Techcrunch faking the Wall Street Journal or Bloomberg with
GAAP, "Street" and earnings per share expressions. Really not what I expect
from TC... I can't help but think that good old days when TC used to explore
new ideas and technologies are gone. Today almost all their writers just post
update about a funding round, a developer conference or a new product feature.
I wish I could get more in-depth articles about major topics like open AI,
future telco/messaging networks, etc.

~~~
forgetsusername
> _I can 't help but think that good old days when TC _

I honestly can't remember what the "good old days" of TC even looked like. MG
Siegler writing fawning pieces about Apple? The latest Arrington drama?

I came for the comment section. When they integrated Facebook, I never went
back.

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throwaway3983
Q4?

------
bearbin
The headline is very confusing - "Microsoft beats Wall Street predictions with
$22.6B revenue" would be a better choice.

~~~
allengeorge
Really? "Street" is a pretty common term for Wall Street (aka. the consensus
opinion of analysts) I've definitely seen it for years.

~~~
jessriedel
I had no idea what it was. Presumed it was some new startup.

------
cmdrfred
I'm sure the horseshoe manufacturing firms beat out Henry Ford for a while.

~~~
sharemywin
Google '98 0 Microsoft 98' 14B

Google '15 74B Microsoft '15 93B

I'd invest in a horseshoe manufacture that grows revenue 4.6B a year for the
last 17 years.

~~~
cmdrfred
Microsoft's pricing model is off the rails. Ever look into Windows Server?
Then the required CALS? It often costs twice the price of the hardware.
Businesses will be moving to Linux/Cloud Apps like Google Docs over
Office/Windows fast. There is little reason to stick with the MS ecosystem
anymore.

~~~
wbkang
Have you tried using Google Sheets vs Excel for more than an hour? Google has
a few more years to catch up for Excel.

~~~
cmdrfred
Have you compared the cost? $399.99[0] for Office 2016. Compare that to Open
Office. Does it provide $399.99 of additional features?

[0][https://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/product...](https://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msusa/en_US/pdp/productID.323023800?gclid=Cj0KEQjwwry8BRDjsbjMpPSDvagBEiQA5oW0nBLU50tXEdAhiTIxaJPLeUflFouVnzOIY97LIt3_Fj0aAjRt8P8HAQ&VID=323801800&s_kwcid=AL!4249!3!87055761978!!!g!198452966898!&WT.mc_id=us_datafeed_pla_google&WT.mc_id=pointitsem&WT.mc_id=office&ef_id=VsSF4gAAAHd50QRJ:20160720165705:s)

~~~
wbkang
Yes, typical power users of Excel would cost way more than that every day.
$399 is tiny even for small business.

~~~
cmdrfred
What features specifically exist in Excel but not in open office?

~~~
dragonwriter
In Office Professional Plus, PowerPivot.

IIRC, LO/OOo have _much_ poorer support for tables and table formulae than
Excel, as well.

~~~
cmdrfred
What percentage of the user base uses that functionality? Especially
considering that at the point you require the ability to "import millions of
rows of data from multiple data sources into a single Excel workbook" you
should probably be using a proper database and stop playing around.

~~~
dragonwriter
> What percentage of the user base uses that functionality?

Tables or PowerPivot? I'd say a substantial share of the institutions
purchasing Office Professional Plus are using at least one of the two in
important processes, even if only a small number of users are directly aware
of it.

> Especially considering that at the point you require the ability to "import
> millions of rows of data from multiple data sources into a single Excel
> workbook" you should probably be using a proper database and stop playing
> around.

PowerPivot _is_ (built on, at least, the feature includes more than just the
database) a proper column-oriented OLAP database.

------
chx
I absolutely hate these confusing words. It is alongside of "surname" and
"last name" \-- why can't you just use "family name" and "given name".

While I understand an investor report needs to be precise the articles about
it needs to use terms people understand. Like "this is how much money came in
the doors" \-- aka. income. I believe the word "revenue" is used for what a
layperson would call "income" and "income" is also used but for something
else.

And then good luck figuring out how much profit they made. I searched and this
article alone [http://phys.org/news/2016-07-microsoft-profit-year-big-
loss....](http://phys.org/news/2016-07-microsoft-profit-year-big-loss.html)
puts it in easy-to-understand way right in the very first sentence:

> Microsoft said Tuesday it posted a profit of $3.1 billion in the just-ended
> quarter

Is that painful to write or what? Because noone else did.

Edit: for example, one could write "Microsoft have sold software and services
for $22.6B and made a profit of $3.1B". That's easy. Also, I realize it's not
perfect (because they also sold hardware and got money from IP deals) but it's
not my task to come up with easy-to-understand phrasing and it only needs to
be done once. It's just an example of how to use words that non-accountant
people can understand.

~~~
droshelovich
GAAP is basically a huge bundle of compromises between corporations and the
FASB. In reality, "revenue" and "income" don't really have rigourous
definitions. Quarterly figures are also often adjusted in subsequent periods.
Unfortunately, many websites simply gloss over this fact and just report the
stated numbers.

~~~
TheSpiceIsLife
As noted in my other comment, I had to look up what GAAP meant.

What's _the FASB_?

~~~
droshelovich
To complicate matters further there is US GAAP, UK GAAP, German GAAP, etc. The
tl;dr of the earlier comment is that accounting reports don't usually reflect
economic realities of large corporations.

There are several companies/methodologies that significantly adjust public
filings to reflect economic realities: [1] [https://www.credit-
suisse.com/sites/holt/en.html](https://www.credit-
suisse.com/sites/holt/en.html) [2]
[http://finance.wharton.upenn.edu/~acmack/Chapter_12_app.pdf](http://finance.wharton.upenn.edu/~acmack/Chapter_12_app.pdf)

~~~
mseebach
I think it's more a case of there not being any singular knowable economic
reality of a sufficiently large organisation -- so you agree on some
principles that are at least somewhat consistent and comparable over time and
between (similar) organisations.

------
known
Revenue dipped to $20.6 billion from $22.2 billion in the same period a year
ago [http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-
news/Microsoft-...](http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-
news/Microsoft-posts-3-1-billion-in-profit-a-year-after-big-
loss/articleshow/53295912.cms)

------
0xmohit
> During today’s earnings call, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella also noted that
> Windows 10 users have now asked Cortana 8 billion questions to date.

Not sure if this qualifies as an achievement. Too many questions would perhaps
suggest that things aren't quite obvious.

Wish I had a Windows box to play around and see what Cortana looks like. A
variant of Clippy?

~~~
sdrothrock
> Not sure if this qualifies as an achievement. Too many questions would
> perhaps suggest that things aren't quite obvious.

> Wish I had a Windows box to play around and see what Cortana looks like. A
> variant of Clippy?

Your comment suggests that you don't know what Cortana is, so I'm not sure how
you're coming to the conclusion that "Too many questions would perhaps suggest
that things aren't quite obvious."

Cortana is a digital assistant, like Apple's Siri. Common queries could be
things like "when's my next appointment," "what time is it in Tokyo," or
"when's the next showing of Interstellar?" It doesn't reflect on Windows
itself possibly being hard to use.

~~~
slededit
Start menu searches are also cortana searches.

~~~
dingo_bat
Start menu searches are not "asking Cortana questions".

~~~
slededit
Do you use windows 10? Click the start menu and your caret is immediately in
the cortana search box. The grey prompt text says "I'm cortana ask me
anything". It works the same if you press the window key on your keyboard.

~~~
dingo_bat
I was referring to the search performed when you open the start menu and start
typing. It doesn't seem like a Cortana "question".

