Written by Nasdaq Index Research, Betashares
Most companies within the Nasdaq 100 Index (NDX) have reported earnings for Q2 2026 and, despite recent macroeconomic uncertainty from tariffs and the Middle East War, the results continue to deliver with the index on track to deliver a blended year-over-year growth rate of approximately 75.1%.
This is significantly higher than the consensus forecast growth rate of 28.9%, supported by stronger-than-expected earnings driven by significant contributions from Amazon and Google which reported large, unrealised gains through their Anthropic holdings.
With this result, the Nasdaq 100 is on pace to deliver its 13th straight quarter of double-digit year-over-year earnings growth.
Semiconductors have been the primary driver of this growth with GPU (graphics processing unit), memory and custom chip makers key beneficiaries of the data centre infrastructure build out, however the Magnificent 7 companies (many of which are hyperscalers) remain key contributors to headline performance given their larger weights within the index.
Overall results were solid, led by cloud revenue growth across Google Cloud Platform, Amazon Web Services and Microsoft Azure. Together, these cloud business units are growing revenues by a rate of 43% on a US$3645 billion trailing twelve-month revenue base in Q2, representing an extraordinary rate of growth which will likely continue.
That’s because enterprise AI adoption will likely continue its acceleration, as increasingly multi-step agentic AI workloads drive sustained growth in inference demand. Demand for AI compute continues to exceed available supply across, while rapidly growing contracted backlogs provide high visibility into future revenues. Together, persistent demand and capacity constraints suggest that much of the incremental infrastructure being deployed can be absorbed and monetised quickly as it comes online, supporting continued elevated cloud growth.
Beyond cloud, we look at some of the other key drivers behind the Magnificent 7’s latest earnings results:
- Alphabet Cloud business grew 82% y/y to $24.8 billion, driven by strong demand for Google Cloud Platform (GCP) across enterprise AI Solutions, enterprise AI Infrastructure and core GCP services.
- Amazon’s AWS delivered its strongest growth in 18 quarters, with both its AI and custom chip businesses surpassing $25 billion in annualized revenue.
- Apple announced a new multi-year agreement with Broadcom, part of its American Manufacturing Program, worth over $30 billion, focusing on custom silicon components and advanced wireless connectivity technologies.
- Meta announced a strategic partnership with BlackRock to develop a 1-gigawatt data center in Texas to support growing compute needs.
- Microsoft’s Q4 Cloud revenue was $59.3 billion, up 27% y/y, reflecting strong demand for Azure and first-party AI applications and services.
- Tesla’s Q2 revenue increased by 25.5% y/y to $28.2 billion with strong growth in core vehicle, energy and services businesses as well as manufacturing, infrastructure and AI initiatives.
Further company highlights
Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN), NDQ weight: 4.7%1
AWS’s AI and custom chip businesses surpass $25 billion in annualized revenue.2
- Fiscal Q2 2026 top-line beat consensus by $3.6 billion (1.8%), while EPS beat consensus by $3.93 per share or 215%. Q2 revenue grew by 19.6% year-over-year (y/y) to $200.6 billion. EBIT grew 42.2% y/y to $27.6 billion while EBIT margins increased 218 basis points (bps) y/y to 13.7%. EBIT benefited from tariff-related refunds of ~$600 million and another ~$600 million related to the change in fair value measurement of energy contracts. A $53.4 billion non-operating pre-tax gain, primarily related to investments in Anthropic helped drive net income by 244.9% y/y to $62.6 billion, while net margins increased to 31.2% vs. 10.8% in Q2 2025. On a quarter-on-quarter (q-o-q) basis, revenue increased by 10.5%.
- North America segment revenues increased 16% y/y to $116.2 billion. International segment revenues increased 15% y/y to $42.2 billion. AWS segment revenues increased 37% y/y to $42.2 billion.
- FY Q3 2026 revenue is expected to be in the range of $197-$202 billion. Capex is expected to be $200 billion for FY 2026; however, higher memory prices may result in upward pressure on capex.
Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL), NDQ Weight: 7.3%3
Agreement with Broadcom, worth over $30 billion, focuses on custom silicon components and advanced wireless connectivity technologies.4
- Fiscal Q3 2026 top-line beat consensus by $378.1 million (0.35%), while EPS beat consensus by $0.13 per share or 6.8%. Q3 revenue increased by 16.4% y/y to $109.4 billion driven by growth across geographies. EBIT increased by 26.6% y/y to $35.7 billion while EBIT margins increased by 260 basis points (bps) y/y to 32.6%. Net income increased by 27.1% y/y to $29.8 billion while net margins increased to 27.2% vs. 24.9% in Q3 2025. On a quarter-on-quarter basis, revenue decreased by 1.6%.
- Products segment revenues increased 18.1% y/y to $78.7 billion. Services segment revenues increased 12.1% y/y to $30.7 billion. iPhone sales increased 21.7% y/y to $54.3 billion driven by the iPhone 17 family. Mac revenue at $10.4 billion grew 28.7% y/y driven by the strength of MacBook Neo and MacBook Pro.
- FY Q4 2026 revenue is expected to be in the range of 9%-11% y/y. Reported growth rate for iPhone is expected to be mid-teens y/y, impacted by foreign exchange headwinds and supply constraints.
Meta Platforms (Nasdaq: META), NDQ Weight: 2.8%5
Strategic partnership with BlackRock to develop a 1-gigawatt data center in Texas.6
- Fiscal Q2 2026 top-line beat consensus by $577.4 million (1.0%), while EPS missed consensus by $1.01 per share or 14.0%. Q2 revenue increased by 28.0% y/y to $60.8 billion. EBIT increased by 3.6% y/y to $21.2 billion while EBIT margins decreased by 819 basis points (bps) y/y to 34.8%. Net income decreased by 13.6% y/y to $15.8 billion while net margins declined to 26.1% vs. 38.6% in Q2 2025. Q2 total expenses were $42 billion, up 55% compared to last year, and included $2.4 billion in legal-related charges and $1.2 billion in severance costs associated with the May 2026 workforce reduction. On a quarter-on-quarter basis, revenue increased by 8.0%.
- Driven primarily by WhatsApp paid messaging and subscriptions revenue, Family of Apps segment revenues increased 28% y/y to $60.4 billion of which Advertising revenues increased 27.5% y/y to $59.4 billion, while Other revenues increased 72.7% y/y to $1.0 billion. Reality Labs segment revenues increased 16.5% y/y to $431 million due to strong growth in AI glasses revenue, partially offset by lower Quest headset sales.
- Fiscal Q3 2026 revenue is expected to be in the range of $61-$64 billion and earnings loss per share is expected to be $0.31. FY 2026 capex including finance leases is expected to be in the range of $130-145 billion, compared with previous outlook of $125-145 billion.
Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), NDQ Weight: 5.9%7
Azure revenue surpasses $100 billion for the first time, and Microsoft 365 Copilot exceeds 30 million paid seats.8
- Fiscal Q4 2026 top-line beat consensus by $2.4 billion (2.7%), while EPS beat consensus by $0.50 per share or 11.8%. Q4 revenue grew by 17.7% y/y to $90.0 billion driven by Cloud growth of 27%. EBIT increased by 18.3% y/y to $40.6 billion while EBIT margins increased by 21 basis points (bps) y/y to 45.1%. Net income increased by 31.3% y/y to $35.8 billion while net margins improved to 410 bps y/y to 39.7%. Diluted EPS benefited by $0.27 from a combination of favorable items, primarily a $3.2 billion gain on the Anthropic investment and lower-than-expected costs related to the Voluntary Retirement Program. These gains were partially offset by severance expenses and impairment charges in the Xbox business. The impact of investments in Open AI was a $480 million net gain in Q4 2026. On a quarter-on-quarter basis, revenue increased by 8.6%.
- Productivity and Business Processes segment revenue increased 14% y/y to $37.8 billion; M365 Commercial Cloud revenue increased 16% y/y driven by growth in revenue per user from premium offerings. Intelligent Cloud segment revenue was $39.3 billion, up 32% y/y, while Azure and Cloud services revenue increased 43% y/y. More Personal Computing segment revenue was $12.9 billion, down 4% y/y driven by XBOX and Windows OEM.
- Fiscal Q1 2027 revenue is expected to be in the range of $89.85-$90.95 billion. Azure and Cloud services revenue is expected to grow by 45% in constant currency. Capex is expected to $50 billion in Q1 2027 and ~$175 billion in calendar year 2026.