Fast Money Blog- 1/31/25

This was a big week on Wall Street, as major Dow and S&P components, including Meta Platforms, Inc. (META), Microsoft Corporation (MSFT), Mastercard Incorporated (MA), Apple, Inc. (AAPL) and Visa Inc. (V), released their earnings reports.

META posted Q4 2024 revenue of $48.4 billion, up 21% year-over-year. 

The company said that they had 3.35 billion daily active visitors for the quarter, up 5% year-over-year

Meta also saw quarterly advertising revenue reach $46.8 billion, a 21% increase year-over-year.

For the full year of 2024, the company had revenue of $164.50 billion, up 22% from 2023.

These results follow CEO Mark Zuckerberg's announcement last week that Meta plans capital expenditure of as much as $65 billion in 2025 to expand its AI infrastructure.

Because of its ad revue META looks to be a major player in the advertising space and a major hold. 

MSFT released their Q2 2025 earnings with revenue of $69.6 billion, up 12% year-over-year.

Some Revenue Highlights

Microsoft’s Intelligent cloud had quarterly revenue of $40.9 billion, up 21% year-over-year. 

The Productivity and Business Processes segment, which includes Dynamics, LinkedIn and the Office suite of products, brought in $29.4 billion, an increase of 14% year-over-year.    

The company also reported that their More Personal Computing revenue came in at $14.7 billion, which was relatively unchanged year-over-year.

In addition, Microsoft reported that profit for the October-December quarter grew 10% year-over year.  

For Q2 Microsoft returned $9.7 billion to shareholders in the form of dividends and share repurchases.

So Tyrone, why did the stock drop after earnings?

Because Microsoft's AI business in Q2 saw a slowdown in revenue growth from prior quarters. 

That said, I believe this is nothing investors need to worry about. 

I still recommend MSFT as a long-term hold. 

S & P component Mastercard Incorporated (MA) reported outstanding Q4 2024 earnings, sending the stock to an all-time high. Robust customer spending drove transaction volume higher. 

Highlights:

Quarterly revenue was $7.5 billion, up 14% year-over-year.

Gross Dollar Volume for the quarter rose 12% year-over-year for a total of $2.6 trillion, including a 20% rise in cross-border volume. 

Full year 2024 revenue came in at $28.2 billion, up 12% year-over-year. 

In even more positive news, Mastercard reported that they have seen U.S. spending volumes increase by 10% in the first four weeks of January, compared with the 8% growth seen in December.

I continue to see strong future revenue for Mastercard and recommend it as a long term hold. 

Dow component Apple, Inc. (AAPL) released its Q1 2025 earnings with top-line revenue of $124.3 billion, a rise of 4% year-over-year.  

Apple’s Segment Highlights 

iPhone revenue came in at $69.1 billion in the quarter, down almost 1% year-over-year. 

Mac revenue was $8.99 billion, up 15.5% year-over-year.

iPad revenue had $8.09 billion in quarterly income, up 15.2% year over year. 

Apple’s services segment brought in $26.3 billion for the quarter, up 14% year-over-year. Apple now has 1 billion subscriptions, which includes both direct subscriptions for services such as Apple TV+ and iCloud, as well as subscriptions to third-party apps through the company’s App Store system. 

Apple’s weak spot: China, whose revenue fell 11% to $18.51 billion, the biggest decline in a year. This marks the sixth straight quarter of declines in Apple’s third-largest region by revenue.  

As a long-term share holder, I don’t believe you should worry about this. 

Apple’s board of directors declared a cash dividend of $0.25 per share.

I see Apple as a great weekly or monthly covered call option.

Now, back to the credit card processing space:

Visa reported strong Q1 2025 results with revenue of $9.5 billion, an increase of 10% year-over-year, showing that consumer spending was robust during the holiday season. 

Here’s what you need to know:

Total payments volume increased 9% year-over-year

Total Processed Transactions increased 11% year-over-year, for a total of $63.8 billion.

Cross-border volume jumped 16% from last year. 

Quarterly service revenue was $4.2 billion, an increase of 8%. This segment includes loyalty programs, advanced security measures like fraud prevention, and personalized offers.

Because of its growing transaction volume I strongly recommend Visa as a long-term hold. 

Get ready, because we still will see the earnings releases of more of our Wealthy Investor stocks in the weeks to come!

Tyrone Jackson, The Wealthy Investor