The 2026 Q1 earnings season faces its busiest week yet, with a wide variety of notable companies on deck to report. Headlining the docket is a bunch of Magnificent 7 members whose sentiment is driven by cloud results, specifically Alphabet GOOGL, Microsoft MSFT, and Amazon AMZN.
Of the trio, Amazon and Alphabet have outperformed nicely relative to the S&P 500, whereas Microsoft shares have lagged YTD, as shown below.
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Amazon Web Services (AWS)
EPS revisions for the upcoming release have shown a bit of negativity, with the current $1.61 Zacks Consensus EPS estimate down roughly 6% over the last several months. Revenue revisions have remained more positive with the $177.5 billion estimate up by a modest 1.2% over the same timeframe. Growth is expected to be delivered again, with the estimates suggesting 1.3% YoY earnings growth on 14.3% higher sales.
Regarding AWS, the most important part of the release, our consensus estimate stands at $36.8 billion, reflecting 25.6% YoY growth. An accelerating/decelerating growth rate among AWS remains the biggest sentiment driver behind the post-earnings reaction, with the forecasted 25.6% growth rate for the upcoming release beating out the prior period’s 23.6% YoY climb modestly.
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Microsoft Needs Acceleration
EPS revisions for Microsoft’s release have been positive, with the current $4.07 Zacks Consensus EPS estimate up by a slight 1.2% over the last several months. Revenue revisions have remained flat, though the stable-to-positive revisions we’ve seen across both the top and bottom lines are a nice positive given MSFT’s 2026 underperformance so far. Double-digit growth is expected for the tech giant, with the quarterly estimates reflecting 17.6% earnings growth on 16.2% higher sales.
Its Intelligent Cloud segment, which includes Azure, will again be the big focus concerning its post-share reaction. Sentiment has largely been beaten down in this business given flat growth rates over recent periods, though management has noted that the stagnation has mostly been due to capacity constraints. Our consensus estimate for Intelligent Cloud revenue stands at $34.3 billion, suggesting a 28.5% YoY growth rate and a slight uptick from the prior period’s 28% climb.
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Google Cloud Growth Remains Robust
Both EPS and sales expectations for Alphabet have been taken nicely higher over recent months, with the Zacks Consensus EPS estimate of $2.64 up 5.2% since the end of January. Likewise, the $92.2 billion sales estimate is 4% higher than it was for the same timeframe. Earnings are forecasted to fall 6% YoY, whereas sales are expected to see a strong 20.5% charge higher.
