Microsoft Stock: Buy, Sell, or Hold?

Shares of Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) have had a difficult year so far. Even after staging a recovery from late-March lows, the stock is still down about 15% year to date as of this writing — meaningfully lagging the broader market. The slump comes despite a fiscal third-quarter report that exceeded expectations on both the top and bottom lines.

So why aren’t investors rushing back in?

A closer look at the latest quarter suggests the market may be looking past the headline numbers and sizing up a more nuanced picture in the software giant’s cloud computing business and commercial backlog — particularly as cloud rivals Alphabet and Amazon deliver a notably different story.

So, is the stock a buy, sell, or hold?