Microsoft is about to party like it’s 1999.
Microsoft (MSFT) The stock soared as much as 5% in premarket trading after a strong earnings report on Thursday, lifting the company to a new all-time high when the market opened on Friday.
The stock broke above $60 for the first time after hours, surpassing Microsoft’s previous all-time high of $59.56 set at the height of the dot com boom in 1999.
Microsoft’s sales hit $22.3 billion last quarter from $21.7 billion a year earlier, led by the success of its cloud computing effort.
Sales of its cloud division rose 6% to $6.7 billion for the quarter. This growth was fueled in part by the resounding success of Azure, its cloud computing platform, which more than doubled its sales year-on-year.
Related: Patriots’ Bill Belichick Says Paper Works Better Than a Microsoft Surface
Microsoft has invested heavily to reposition itself as an industry leader in cloud services, rivaling companies such as Amazon (AMZN).
That helped Microsoft cushion the blow of a failed investment in smartphones and a declining PC market, driving down its Windows license sales. And not a moment too soon.
The company’s struggling phone division has seen sales drop 72% year-on-year. Gaming revenue, a new financial category for Microsoft highlighting Xbox-related sales, also fell 5%.
CNN Money (New York) First published October 20, 2016: 4:53 p.m. ET
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