---
type: "Topics"
locale: "en"
url: "https://longbridge.com/en/topics/40285580.md"
description: "$Microsoft(MSFT.US) What is the most important core metric to watch for the company?What big money is really watching are three sets of "supply-demand matching" data, not the total volume:•  Azure's "implied excess demand growth": Not the published percentage, but management's hint of "how many more percentage points this quarter could have been if not for GPU/data center capacity bottlenecks." This is the key to verifying how hungry real enterprise AI demand is. Over the past few quarters, the market has known that demand far exceeds supply. If this time the "gap is narrowing," it's a signal that AI capital expenditure is truly starting to translate into high-margin revenue.•  The monetization depth of Copilot (not the number of paid seats): Institutions don't care about how many more seats were added, but look at the ARR increase per seat, the actual embedding of agentic AI in enterprise workflows, and whether it's driving multi-year agency contracts. If the RPO (Remaining Performance Obligation) growth rate continues to exceed 100% YoY, and management can provide specific cases of "AI-driven contract renewals/expansions," then it's truly being realized.•  The resilience of Intelligent Cloud gross margin under massive CapEx: This is the most underestimated metric. Institutions calculate how much CapEx depreciation drags down gross margin. If gross margin can hold steady or even expand slightly, it proves the ROI of AI infrastructure is starting a positive cycle; if it continues to be compressed and management doesn't give clear guidance that "the CapEx peak has passed," capital will question the sustainability of "burning cash for growth."These three things together are the core switch for big money to judge whether the "AI story is moving from hype to the verification stage."How much expectation has the current stock price already priced in?The current valuation (forward PE roughly in the 22-25x range) has actually priced in the pessimistic expectations of "slowing AI growth + capacity bottlenecks + delayed monetization" quite fully.The stock has significantly underperformed the broader market this year. The implied market assumption is: Azure can only maintain mid-to-high double-digit growth, Copilot is just a "conceptual add-on" in the short term, and CapEx will continue to burn cash at a high level with unclear short-term ROI. The pricing given by the market is closer to "mature cloud giant + AI option value" rather than "explosive AI growth company." This also explains why, even with solid fundamentals, the stock price is prone to pullbacks at the slightest sign of trouble—the negatives have already been cleared out in advance, while positives need to exceed expectations to truly push it higher."
datetime: "2026-04-29T12:48:37.000Z"
locales:
  - [en](https://longbridge.com/en/topics/40285580.md)
  - [zh-CN](https://longbridge.com/zh-CN/topics/40285580.md)
  - [zh-HK](https://longbridge.com/zh-HK/topics/40285580.md)
author: "[LionKing333](https://longbridge.com/en/profiles/15271482.md)"
---

# $Microsoft(MSFT.US) What is the most important cor…


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