Microsoft Reports Biggest Quarterly Loss Ever

By Tess Stynes 

Microsoft Corp. said its revenue fell 5.1% in its latest quarter, hurt by continued weak PC demand, and posted its biggest quarterly loss ever on a hefty write-down and other items related to the Nokia mobile-phone business acquired last year.

For the period ended June 30, revenue decreased to $22.18 billion from $23.38 billion a year earlier. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters expected revenue of $22.03 billion.

Per-share earnings, after stripping out the write-down and other one-time items, also beat expectations.

Microsoft's Windows smartphones have a tiny share of the smartphone market, which is dominated by market leader Apple Inc.'s iPhone.

Earlier this month Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft said its was writing down about 80% of the $9.4 billion deal for Nokia's handset business and that it would cut more than 6% of its global workforce--mostly in its mobile-phone operation--a year after an earlier round of job cuts to the business.

Overall, Microsoft reported a loss of $3.2 billion, or 40 cents a share, compared with a year-earlier profit of $4.61 billion, or 55 cents a share. Excluding the write-down, restructuring charges and other items, per-share earnings were 62 cents. Analysts expected per-share profit of 56 cents.

Investors likely will be interested in what Chief Executive Satya Nadella's has to say on the conference call about the strategy for turning Microsoft's mobile business around.

The latest version of Microsoft's operating system--Windows 10--is due to come out next week. However, analysts ahead of the earnings report weren't expecting the updated software will do much to boost weak sales trends for personal computers. Wall Street also will be watching for any details on how the new Windows software will affect Microsoft's financial performance.

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