• Microsoft shares are experiencing downward pressure. Why is MSFT stock retreating?

Significant Artificial Intelligence Spend

Microsoft is on track to spend at least $500 million annually with Anthropic, the artificial intelligence company behind several large language models including Claude. According to The Information, Microsoft is one of Anthropic’s largest customers and will use the technology to power its own products.

Downstream Benefits For Microsoft

A Morgan Stanley note from Wednesday morning affirmed that Microsoft is the preferred public cloud vendor of many chief information officers.

The note, which shares results from a survey of CIOs from the fourth quarter of 2025, said that companies expect their software spend to accelerate this year, going from +3.7% in 2025 to +3.8% in 2026.

Analyst Keith Weiss said Microsoft is the best positioned platform to continue benefitting from improving spending conditions, as the CIOs surveyed indicated that more than half of their application workload is based in Microsoft Azure.

The survey also revealed the fifth consecutive sequential increase of CIOs leveraging Microsoft’s M365 Copilot AI capabilities, with 80% planning to use M365 Copilot in the next twelve months.

“Microsoft remains [the] key generative AI winner benefitting from durable cloud transformation tailwinds,” the analyst wrote in the note.

Microsoft Stock Is Falling

MSFT Price Action: Microsoft shares were down 1.31% at $464.47 at the time of publication on Wednesday, according to Benzinga Pro.

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