Opinion: Google and Microsoft earnings show that the bar has been lowered for Big Tech

Microsoft MSFT,
-2.68%
Missed revenue and profit forecast, predicted that the cloud businessAzure, will grow about 43% in the September quarter, Amid fears of slowing cloud growth. While a slowdown of four percentage points from the previous quarter’s growth rate has led to sharp declines in the past, Microsoft stock jumped as soon as forecasts were made.

Google Alphabet The Google Alphabet,
-2.32%

GOOG,
-2.56%
reported a decline in profits for the second consecutive quarter, told analysts on his conference call that the slowdown in ad buyers affected the second quarter. However, Alphabet shares are up nearly 5% in post-close trading.

“In the context of the weak macro background, Alphabet’s second-quarter results were good, with nearly consistent revenue across all key business segments,” Baird Equity Research analyst Colin Sebastian wrote in a note to clients. The general opinion on Wall Street was that things were not yet as bad as he had feared.

Much like the relief rally Meta Platforms Inc. dead,
-4.50%
Three months ago, however, this is a case of numbers that, while good enough to avoid a drop in stock, shouldn’t actually be considered “good.” Both companies have warned about the macro economy, and it is clear that every company with business is slowing sharply at the moment.

In the case of Alphabet, revenue on YouTube, a recent star, grew a meager 3% in the second quarter, compared to 14.3% growth in the first quarter, due to advertisers’ overall decline in spending and more competition from TikTok. Microsoft has seen a downturn in its PC business, with the pandemic’s big PC boom coming to an end. The advertising slowdown is also affecting its LinkedIn business, while the Xbox business is slowing quickly as the pandemic-fuelled boom in video games fades.

But those stocks don’t face the anger allotted to some smaller competitors. Last week, social media company Snap Inc. explode, explode,
-3.22%
Starch More concerns among investors about online advertising spendingAnd the And its stock fell The macroeconomy struggles with inflation, changing consumer patterns and rising interest rates.

Microsoft and Google have managed to avoid the same fate, although the slowdown could take longer to actually affect very large companies, which have dominant positions in important industries. But make no mistake, there is a slowdown, and it is affecting the big tech companies, perhaps not so much that it will result in significant portions of their huge market caps being taken out — until now..