What Is Microsoft Stock (MSFT)? A Share in Azure and Windows

Most office workers start the day inside the same few programs: an email inbox, a spreadsheet, a video call and a shared folder of documents. Behind those tools sits a vast network of data centers that companies rent by the hour to run their own software and, more and more, their artificial intelligence. The firm that sells all of it collects money from almost every business on the planet, often without the people at the desk ever paying a bill themselves.

Buying a piece of that firm has usually meant a US brokerage account, a bank transfer in dollars and an order placed while New York is open. That is easy for someone with a US bank, and slow for someone whose savings already sit in stablecoins on an exchange. The headlines that move the price also tend to arrive when it is late at night for half the world.

Crypto venues now offer a way around that wait. A stock perpetual is a contract with no expiry that tracks the price of a share. You trade the price from a USDT balance, long or short, while the shares themselves stay on the stock market.

The company is Microsoft, and BloFin lists its stock as the MSFTUSDT Perpetual, a USDT-settled contract you can trade with up to 20x leverage. Before you weigh that route, it helps to know exactly what one Microsoft share is and what owning one would give you.

What is Microsoft stock?

Microsoft stock is a share of Microsoft Corporation, the Redmond, Washington, company behind Windows, Microsoft 365, Azure and Xbox, and it is listed on Nasdaq as MSFT. At the close on October 23, 2026 one share cost $524.51, which valued the company at about $3.9 trillion across its 7.4 billion shares (source: Stock Analysis).

That share count comes from Microsoft's annual report for the year that ended June 30, 2026, which listed 7,425,545,491 shares of common stock outstanding on July 23, 2026 (source: Microsoft Form 10-K for fiscal 2026). Multiply that count by the price and you get market value, the figure most quote pages call market cap. It moves every trading minute, because the count changes slowly and the price changes all day.

Most of those details come straight from Microsoft's own investor pages, which give the date of its initial public offering (IPO), the CUSIP, the fiscal year and the current dividend (source: Microsoft investor FAQ). A CUSIP is a nine-character ID that US markets give each security, and a broker's search box will often accept it in place of the ticker when two names look alike.

The single class matters more than it sounds. Some large technology companies split their stock into classes so that founders keep extra votes. Microsoft registers just one class of common stock with the regulator, so every share carries the same vote and the same claim on profits (source: Microsoft Form 10-K for fiscal 2026). A small shareholder holds exactly the same kind of share as the biggest fund manager.

Size is the other thing to know before anything else. Microsoft carried the third-largest weight in the S&P 500 at the October 23 close, behind Nvidia and Apple (source: Stock Analysis S&P 500 list). In the Nasdaq-100 it also ranked third, carrying 6.21% of the index (source: Stock Analysis Nasdaq-100 list). If you own almost any broad US stock fund, part of your money is already in Microsoft.

Microsoft's listing since 1986

Microsoft has traded on Nasdaq since its initial public offering on March 13, 1986, when shares were sold at $21 each (source: Microsoft investor FAQ). Forty years later it ranks among the most valuable companies in the world, and the market-value milestones along the way show how a maker of PC software grew into a cloud and AI business.

Bill Gates and Paul Allen started Microsoft in 1975, and Satya Nadella has been its chief executive since February 2014 (source: Microsoft company history). The share you buy today is the same security that listed in 1986, only cut into many more pieces. Microsoft split its stock nine times between 1987 and 2003, so the $21 price from 1986 tells you little about what a single share costs now. Microsoft's price history and cycles follows the share through each long rise and fall, from the dot-com peak to the 2026 record.

A big step in reputation came in 1999. On November 1 of that year, Microsoft and Intel joined the Dow Jones Industrial Average along with Home Depot and SBC Communications. They were the first two Nasdaq companies ever added to the Dow, and Chevron, Goodyear, Sears and Union Carbide left to make room (source: Christian Science Monitor).

The trillion-dollar marks came much later. Each one arrived during a trading session, as the price briefly cleared the line.

The gaps between the marks shrank fast. The first trillion arrived 33 years after the listing, while the climb from $3 trillion to $4 trillion took about 18 months. A higher market value shows how large the company has become, and it says nothing about which way the share moves next.

What one Microsoft share gives you

One Microsoft share is an equal slice of the whole company. It carries one vote at the annual meeting, a $0.98 cash dividend each quarter, and a claim on what is left if the business closes. With about 7.4 billion shares in issue, your one share is a tiny but exact fraction of everything Microsoft owns and earns.

The dividend is steady and small next to the price. Microsoft announced the raise to $0.98 a share on September 15, 2026, 7 cents more than the $0.91 it paid that month (source: Microsoft dividend release, September 2026). Four payments of $0.98 come to $3.92 a year, which at the October 23 close of $524.51 is a yield of about 0.7%. Most of what a Microsoft holder has earned over the years has come from the rising price, with the dividend adding a little on top.

The vote is real, but it is spread thin. At the 2024 annual meeting, 6,417,206,480 shares were voted in person or by proxy on directors, pay and a set of shareholder proposals (source: Microsoft Form 8-K, December 2024). One share is one of those votes. The 2026 meeting is set for December 8, 2026, and shareholders on the books at the close on September 30, 2026 can vote at it (source: Microsoft dividend release, September 2026).

Most owners never appear on Microsoft's own register. The company counted 74,199 registered holders of record on July 23, 2026 (source: Microsoft Form 10-K for fiscal 2026). A holder of record is someone named directly in the company's books, so the millions of people who own Microsoft through a broker or a fund sit inside a few large accounts. Who owns Microsoft's shares, from index funds to its founders, explains where the big blocks sit.

Microsoft's two business segments

Microsoft brought in $331.8 billion of revenue in its 2026 fiscal year, which ended on June 30, up 18%, and kept $133.7 billion as net income (source: Microsoft Form 10-K for fiscal 2026). From fiscal 2027 it reports that business in two segments: Agents and Infra, covering cloud services and business software, and Devices and Consumer, covering Windows, Xbox and advertising.

The new split was announced on September 2, 2026, and Microsoft restated its fiscal 2026 numbers on the new basis so investors could compare like with like (source: Microsoft FY27 segments presentation). The two segments are very different in size. Restated for fiscal 2026, Agents and Infra brought in about $81 of every $100 of Microsoft's revenue (source: Microsoft FY27 segments presentation). The consumer side, Windows licenses sold with new PCs, Xbox games and search ads, is still a large business on its own, but it earns a far thinner margin.

Inside Agents and Infra, Azure is the line most investors check first. Azure is Microsoft's cloud platform, where companies rent computing power and AI services and pay for what they use. It is one of the three big cloud platforms, alongside Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud, and the US stocks BloFin lists as perpetuals include the companies behind all three. How Microsoft makes money breaks both segments into their eight revenue lines, from Azure to Xbox.

One more item sits outside the segments and can swing the profit line. Microsoft describes itself as "a major investor in OpenAI", and gains on that investment added $5.0 billion to its fiscal 2026 net income (source: Microsoft Form 10-K for fiscal 2026). That is 3.7% of the year's profit, which is why Microsoft also reports an adjusted earnings figure that leaves the OpenAI gains and losses aside.

Microsoft's fiscal year

Microsoft's fiscal year runs from July 1 to June 30, so its first quarter is July to September (source: Microsoft investor FAQ). Each fiscal year takes the number of the year in which it ends. Fiscal 2027 began on July 1, 2026, which is why a report published in October 2026 covers "Q1 FY2027".

That one rule clears up most confusing headlines. A story about Microsoft's "second quarter" in January is about October to December, even though most companies call those months their fourth quarter. In fiscal 2027 the four quarters fall in these calendar months.

Microsoft scheduled its Q1 FY2027 release for Wednesday, October 28, 2026, after the Nasdaq close (source: Microsoft investor FAQ). BloFin's Q1 FY2027 earnings preview sets out what Microsoft has guided for that quarter, and how to read a Microsoft earnings report walks through each figure.

Microsoft stock in October 2026

Microsoft stock set a record close on October 13, 2026, beating the previous record close of October 28, 2025, and at that close the company was worth about $4.0 trillion (source: Yahoo Finance MSFT history). The biggest step in that climb came after the fiscal 2026 annual report on July 29, when the share rose 15.5% in the next session.

By the October 23 close the share stood 3.5% below that record, as investors waited for the next set of numbers.

By that close Microsoft had set three dates for the rest of 2026. The Q1 FY2027 report on October 28 is the first under the two new segments, so it is the first time Agents and Infra and Devices and Consumer appear in a regular quarterly release. The raised $0.98 dividend goes ex on November 19, 2026, and the annual meeting follows on December 8, 2026 (source: Microsoft dividend release, September 2026). Each one gives the market a fresh reason to reprice the stock.

Microsoft and bitcoin

Microsoft holds no bitcoin that it has disclosed, and its shareholders turned down the idea at the annual meeting on December 10, 2024. A proposal asking the board to assess investing in bitcoin drew 0.55% of the votes cast (source: Microsoft Form 8-K, December 2024). Buying Microsoft is a bet on software, cloud computing and AI, with no crypto treasury underneath it.

That matters if you hold crypto and want to know what you are adding. Microsoft's price is driven by its own reports and by how much companies spend on cloud and AI, which is a different set of forces from the ones behind bitcoin. How closely the two prices move together changes from one year to the next. Check the correlation between Microsoft stock and bitcoin over the period you care about before you treat one as a hedge for the other.

Ways to get Microsoft exposure

There are four main ways to get Microsoft exposure: buy the share through a broker, buy a fund that holds it, buy a token backed by a share, or trade the MSFTUSDT Perpetual on BloFin. Only the broker route makes you a shareholder, with the share held for you in the broker's name.

A broker is the classic way in: you fund an account in dollars and buy whole shares or, at many brokers, a fraction of one. A fund is the indirect way, because index funds that track the Nasdaq-100 hold Microsoft at its index weight, so at the October 23 weights each dollar in such a fund put about 6 cents into Microsoft (source: Stock Analysis Nasdaq-100 list).

Tokenized shares work through a token company that keeps real shares with a custodian and mints tokens against them. BloFin does not list a Microsoft spot token, so on BloFin your way to Microsoft is the perpetual, where you post USDT as margin and trade Microsoft's price, long or short. You can compare the routes for buying Microsoft with crypto on cost, hours and rights.

Trading Microsoft through BloFin's perpetual

The MSFTUSDT Perpetual is a USDT-margined contract on BloFin whose price follows Microsoft stock through an index, with no expiry date. You trade it long or short from a USDT balance, with 1x to 20x leverage, and you close it with an order on the other side whenever you choose (source: BloFin MSFT contract details).

BloFin builds that index from Microsoft prices quoted by third-party data vendors. If no outside price comes in, the index freezes at its last reading (source: BloFin MSFTUSDT listing notice). The contract carries no rights in the company. BloFin's stock futures notice says these contracts do not entitle you to dividends, voting rights or other shareholder rights (source: BloFin stock futures notice). What you trade is the price, settled in USDT, and nothing else.

At 20x, BloFin holds 2.5% of the position's value as maintenance margin, so a move of roughly 2.5% against you can trigger liquidation (source: BloFin MSFT position tiers). A higher setting moves the liquidation price closer to your entry, so check that distance before you choose one.

What the MSFT perpetual is covers its contract terms, trading hours and funding in one place. You can see today's mark price, funding rate and order book on the MSFTUSDT Perpetual page.

Microsoft beside other big tech stocks on BloFin

Microsoft is one of several large US technology stocks that BloFin lists as USDT perpetuals, alongside Apple, Nvidia, Amazon, Alphabet, Meta, Oracle and Tesla. That lets you follow Microsoft and its closest rivals from one USDT balance, each priced from its own share under BloFin's stock-futures rules.

The rivals matter because Microsoft shares many of its drivers with them. Amazon and Alphabet run the two other large cloud platforms, so a strong or weak cloud quarter at one of them can move the others too. Nvidia makes the AI chips that cloud companies buy in bulk, and Oracle sells cloud computing and databases to many of the same corporate buyers.

Each of these contracts has its own page with price limits, order sizes and funding history. Comparing them is a good way to see which part of Microsoft's story is its own and which part the whole group shares.

Looking to gain exposure to Microsoft? To get started, you'll need to first create a BloFin account, fund your account with cryptocurrency, and go to the MSFTUSDT Perpetual trading page.

Frequently asked questions

Is Microsoft part of the Magnificent Seven?

Microsoft is one of the Magnificent Seven, a nickname for seven very large US technology stocks that took hold in 2023. Bank of America analyst Michael Hartnett is credited with borrowing it from the title of a 1960s film (source: Fox Business). The other six are Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Nvidia and Tesla. The group has no official membership rules, but because the seven are so big, together they make up a large part of the value of the S&P 500 (source: Stock Analysis S&P 500 list).

Has Microsoft stock ever split?

Microsoft has split its stock nine times, seven times two-for-one and twice three-for-two, from September 1987 to its last split, which took effect on February 18, 2003 (source: Microsoft investor FAQ). Multiply those ratios together and one share bought at the 1986 IPO has become 288 shares. Adjusted for those splits, each 1986 share sold for roughly 7 cents, which is why long-run charts show the 1986 price so close to zero.

Can you buy Microsoft stock directly from Microsoft?

Yes, through a plan. Microsoft's transfer agent, Computershare, runs a direct stock purchase plan and a dividend reinvestment plan for Microsoft stock (source: Microsoft investor FAQ). A direct plan lets you buy shares without a regular broker and can reinvest your dividends into more shares.

When does Microsoft pay its next dividend?

The next Microsoft dividend is $0.98 a share, payable on December 10, 2026 to shareholders on the books at the close on November 19, 2026, which is also the ex-dividend date (source: Microsoft dividend release, September 2026). To receive it, you need to own the share before the ex-dividend date. The payment before it, $0.91 a share, went out on September 10, 2026 (source: Microsoft dividend release, June 2026).

Does the ticker MSFT cover anything besides Microsoft's shares?

Microsoft lists two bonds on Nasdaq under the same MSFT symbol: its 3.125% Notes due 2028 and its 2.625% Notes due 2033 (source: Microsoft Form 10-K for fiscal 2026). They are loans to the company that pay fixed interest, so they behave very differently from the common stock. When you search for MSFT at a broker, make sure the result says common stock before you place an order.

Researched and written by the BloFin Academy editorial team with AI-assisted drafting. All facts independently verified. Primary sources include Microsoft's Form 10-K for fiscal 2026, its September 2026 segment presentation and December 2024 Form 8-K, its investor FAQ and its June and September 2026 dividend releases, Stock Analysis and Yahoo Finance market data for MSFT, the Christian Science Monitor, AFP, GIGAZINE, Reuters, Al Jazeera and Fox Business. BloFin's sources are its MSFT contract details and position tiers, its MSFTUSDT listing notice and its stock futures notice, current as of October 26, 2026.

Nothing in this article constitutes financial advice, and nothing in it is a recommendation to buy, sell or hold Microsoft in any form. A Microsoft share carries the company's own risks, from a weak cloud quarter to a fall in what investors will pay for AI growth, and its price can drop sharply between one close and the next. The MSFTUSDT Perpetual gives you no share, dividend or vote, its funding payments can cost you money every eight hours, and at high leverage a move of a few percent can liquidate your whole margin. Past performance does not indicate future results. Do your own research and consider your risk tolerance before you trade on BloFin.