The Most Important Earnings Week of 2026

This is probably the most important earnings week of twenty twenty six. Five massive technology companies report between Wednesday and Thursday. Not spread out over weeks. All at once.

Microsoft, Meta, and Tesla all report Wednesday after close. ASML reports Wednesday before open. Apple reports Thursday after close.

The market has been nervous about AI spending. Microsoft and Meta both pushed capex past sixty billion dollars, and investors want to see if that spending is actually translating to revenue growth. If the numbers disappoint, it will not just hit those two stocks. It will reprice the entire AI trade.

ASML is the only company that makes the machines needed to produce advanced AI chips. Their guidance will tell us if chip demand is real or if the industry is getting ahead of itself.

Apple closes out the week. Whatever tone Wednesday sets, Apple has to deal with on Thursday.

Three of these companies report on the same night. If one misses or walks back guidance, the others get hit immediately. There is no time to adjust.

This week sets up the rest of twenty twenty six.

Microsoft reports Wednesday after close.

Expected numbers are revenue of eighty point two billion dollars and earnings per share of three dollars eighty eight cents.

Azure growth is the key metric. The street is expecting around sixty eight point five billion dollars in total cloud revenue, with the new Azure AI Services segment hitting ten point eight billion dollars for the fiscal year.

The real question is capex. Microsoft's capital spending has gone from forty four point five billion dollars in fiscal year twenty twenty four to an expected sixty three point six billion dollars in fiscal year twenty twenty five. That is a massive ramp, and it is projected to hit seventy one point nine billion dollars in fiscal year twenty twenty six.

If Azure growth justifies that spending, the stock holds. If there is any sign that AI revenue is not keeping pace with AI costs, it is going to get ugly fast.

Microsoft's guidance on the earnings call matters more than the quarterly numbers. The market wants to hear that Copilot and AI services are converting spend into actual revenue. Azure grew thirty seven percent in constant currency guidance for the second quarter of fiscal twenty twenty six. That number needs to hold or accelerate.

The company has a contracted backlog of three hundred ninety two billion dollars. That is strong. The question is whether they can execute on converting that backlog to revenue without margin compression. Microsoft Cloud gross margin has been declining as they scale AI infrastructure. If margins compress further while capex stays elevated, investors will question the returns.

Meta reports Wednesday after close.

Expected numbers are revenue of fifty eight point four billion dollars and earnings per share of eight dollars fifteen cents. Revenue growth is expected at twenty point seven percent year over year.

Revenue growth looks solid, but the market tanked Meta's stock after the last quarter when they raised their twenty twenty five capex forecast to seventy two billion dollars and said twenty twenty six would be notably larger.

Investors want to see two things.

First, is ad revenue keeping up with user engagement. Meta is betting that better AI driven ranking and recommendations will drive higher monetization. If engagement is up but monetization is flat, that is a problem. Average revenue per person hit a record fourteen point four six dollars in the third quarter of twenty twenty five. That number needs to keep climbing.

Second, what is the updated capex number for twenty twenty six. If they raise it again without showing clear return on investment from the AI buildout, the stock will get hit. Current consensus expects around one hundred seven billion dollars in capex for twenty twenty six, up roughly fifty five percent year over year.

Meta has beaten earnings for twelve straight quarters, but the stock dropped eleven percent after the last report. The bar is high, and guidance matters more than the beat.

The company's AI ads automation platform has reached a sixty billion dollar run rate. That is real revenue. The tension is that expenses are growing faster than revenue. Full year twenty twenty five expenses are expected to be one hundred sixteen to one hundred eighteen billion dollars, up twenty two to twenty four percent year over year. Twenty twenty six expense growth is expected to accelerate further.

If Meta cannot show that margin expansion is coming once infrastructure is built out, free cash flow estimates compress and the stock reprices lower.

Tesla reports Wednesday after close.

Earnings are expected to drop nearly forty percent year over year. Revenue growth should return after two flat quarters.

Tesla's valuation is insane right now. Trading at almost two hundred times forward earnings. The stock rallied forty percent in the second half of twenty twenty five on hype around self driving and robotics, not because of car sales.

Delivery numbers have been weak. The company delivered four hundred eighteen thousand vehicles in the fourth quarter of twenty twenty five, down sixteen percent year over year. Full year deliveries fell eight point six percent. The affordable models they have talked about have not helped much yet.

The market is not pricing Tesla like a car company anymore. It is pricing it like an AI robotics bet. That means Elon needs to deliver progress on Full Self Driving and the robotaxi vision, not just talk about it.

FSD is shifting to a subscription only model starting February fourteenth. Ninety nine dollars per month instead of an eight thousand dollar upfront payment. The problem is adoption. Only twelve percent of the fleet currently uses FSD. The company needs ten million active FSD subscriptions to hit targets tied to Elon's compensation package. Converting meaningful volume to subscriptions at scale has not been demonstrated.

Robotaxi operations in Austin and the Bay Area are running at approximately two hundred vehicles. That is subscale. If the earnings call focuses on cars and does not give concrete updates on autonomy, the stock could pull back hard.

Tesla only beat earnings once in the last five quarters, but the stock still went up after four of those reports because the narrative stayed strong. This time, the narrative needs to be backed up.

Energy storage deployment hit a record fourteen point two gigawatt hours in the fourth quarter. That is a bright spot. But the energy business is small relative to automotive revenue and carries tighter margins.

ASML reports Wednesday before open.

Expected numbers are Q4 revenue of nine point two to nine point eight billion euros and gross margin of fifty one to fifty three percent. Twenty twenty six guidance is the big one.

ASML is the only company in the world that makes the extreme ultraviolet lithography machines needed to produce cutting edge AI chips. They have a monopoly on the tech.

TSMC just announced fifty two to fifty six billion dollars in capex for twenty twenty six. That spending flows directly to ASML. If ASML's guidance matches that momentum, it confirms that chip demand is real and the AI buildout is accelerating.

But ASML has been conservative. They have said twenty twenty six revenue will not fall below twenty twenty five levels, but they have also warned about declining sales to China due to export restrictions. The company saw very strong business in China during twenty twenty four and twenty twenty five as Chinese customers front loaded orders ahead of potential restrictions. Management explicitly warned that China customer demand and total net sales in China will decline significantly in twenty twenty six compared to the prior two years.

The market wants to see order intake, backlog, gross margin guidance approaching fifty six percent, and revenue growth for twenty twenty six and twenty twenty seven.

If ASML delivers bullish guidance, it validates the entire semiconductor supply chain. If they are cautious, it raises questions about whether the AI infrastructure spend is sustainable.

ASML's report happens before the market opens Wednesday. That means Microsoft, Meta, and Tesla will be priced off ASML's tone before they even report.

Analysts at Morgan Stanley and Bernstein are anticipating Q4 order intakes could reach historical peaks of eight to nine billion euros driven by urgent need for EUV lithography machines for the next generation of two nanometer and one point four nanometer chips.

Apple reports Thursday after close.

Expected numbers show revenue growing nine percent in fiscal twenty twenty six, the fastest growth since twenty twenty one. Services revenue is expected at twenty six point seven billion dollars for the quarter.

iPhone sales have been soft, but Services is holding the company up. The Services segment has seventy five percent gross margins and is expected to hit one hundred twenty billion dollars by the end of fiscal twenty twenty seven.

Apple is trading at thirty one times forward earnings, second highest in the Mag Seven behind Tesla. At that valuation, they need growth to accelerate, not just stabilize.

The big question is AI. Apple Intelligence launched, but it has not driven a clear upgrade cycle yet. The market wants to see if AI features are actually getting people to buy new iPhones or if it is just noise.

Management guided for ten to twelve percent revenue growth in fiscal Q1 twenty twenty six, with iPhone revenue expected to grow at a double digit rate. If the actual number comes in at the low end or if guidance for the rest of the fiscal year is cautious, the stock reprices lower.

Apple also has to deal with whatever happened on Wednesday night. If Microsoft, Meta, or Tesla missed and the market is already down, Apple's bar goes even higher.

Services growth and iPhone commentary will set the tone. If Apple can show that the ecosystem is expanding and AI is starting to drive behavior, the stock holds. If iPhone sales are still sluggish and Services growth is slowing, it is going to be a rough day Friday.

The company has long term supplier agreements that shield it from some of the RAM price increases hitting the industry. But those contracts eventually expire. Any commentary on component costs and margin pressure will matter.

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This analysis is for educational purposes. It does not constitute investment advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Investors should conduct their own due diligence and consult financial advisors.