Microsoft's Sales Get Azure Boost; Tax Charge Leads to Net Loss (FB)
Microsoft Corp. topped analysts’ estimates for second-quarter revenue, helped by brisk quarterly growth in its cloud and corporate-software businesses, while a tax charge caused the company to report a net loss. The software maker said it had a $13.8 billion charge related to taxes owed on overseas cash, a result of recent changes to U.S. tax law. Sales of Azure cloud-computing services almost doubled as businesses increasingly seek to run applications and store data in Microsoft’s data centers.