"Super Thursday" is here! The Federal Reserve stages "Powell's last dance," and the four giants are releasing their financial reports on the same day.

Within one day, Wall Street has to digest four major tech giants' earnings reports and multiple interest rate decisions—this day is regarded by the market as "the most important earnings day in recent years."

On April 29 Eastern Time (early hours to morning on April 30 Beijing Time), Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Meta, and Microsoft will all release their quarterly results after the same trading day's close. Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve FOMC will conclude its two-day meeting and announce the rate decision, and Fed Chair Powell will host the last press conference of his term. The Bank of England and the European Central Bank will also announce their latest rate decisions that day.

Northwestern Mutual’s Chief Portfolio Manager Matt Stucky has characterized this day as "one of the most important earnings days in recent years." The four companies have a combined market value of about $11.6 trillion, accounting for more than 19% of the S&P 500 index, and any earnings volatility is enough to sway the market.

The S&P 500 and Nasdaq have rebounded about 11% and 18% respectively from recent lows, with capital flowing back into technology and data center-related sectors. The core narrative driving this rebound is the ongoing expansion of AI investment, and this round of earnings will serve as the key test of whether the story can continue.

Thursday's schedule overview, compiled by Wallstreetcn

A $650 Billion AI Bill, the Market Wants Returns

This year, the four companies' combined capital expenditure budget is as high as $650 billion: Google guides $175 to $185 billion, Meta $115 to $135 billion, Amazon about $200 billion, and Microsoft had a single quarter capex of $37.5 billion last quarter.

Money continues to flow in, but market patience is narrowing.

Bernstein analyst Mark Shmulik wrote in a report last week that the four mega-scale cloud providers need to simultaneously deliver three things: AI-driven revenue that beats expectations, maintain capital expenditure budgets without cuts, and show cost control through layoffs or pricing power. “Overall, the setup entering earnings season is quite clear and consistent.”

Citizens analyst Andrew Boone told MarketWatch, "The entire AI ecosystem is currently subject to supply constraints"—infrastructure and energy are insufficient to meet demand for computing power. Thus, the four companies need to prove they can quickly bring data center capacity online and digest backlog orders. "Part of the question is, who can execute well enough and actually deploy their capital expenditures."

Signals on the demand side remain strong. Boone pointed out that since 2026, computing power demand has increased rapidly: Anthropic signed a batch of new agreements to expand access to AI infrastructure; Amazon announced it would supply Meta with tens of millions of custom Graviton chips; Google revealed at last week's Google Cloud Next conference that its models' daily processed token count has risen from 10 billion last quarter to 16 billion.

Different Pressures for Each Company, Microsoft in the Most Delicate Position

Google's pressure is mainly on the cost side. The company previously indicated that this year's depreciation growth will accelerate in Q1 and rise significantly for the full year. The market's concern is not whether Google will continue investing, but whether cloud and AI-related revenues can digest these expenses faster.

Meta faces a direct proposition. It has the strongest advertising cash flow and the most aggressive infrastructure investments. The company has made clear that capital expenditures will rise to $115 to $135 billion in 2026, but full-year operating profit will still be higher than in 2025. Once earnings are released, the market will quickly judge: can the profitability of the ad business continue to cover the pace of AI investment expansion?

Amazon's problem is not just spending a lot, but that much of the money spent will materialize returns later. CEO Andy Jassy stated in his shareholder letter that most of the cloud capital expenditures in 2026 will gradually turn into returns in 2027 and 2028. AWS added 3.9GW of power capacity in 2025 and expects total capacity to double by the end of 2027, but the company admits capacity constraints and unmet demand exist. This time, the market will pay particular attention to what management says about customer commitments, ramping up capacity, and the pace of realizing returns.

Microsoft is in the most delicate position. Matt Stucky believes Microsoft carries the highest risk among the four. Last quarter, Azure's cloud growth disappointed the market, Copilot enterprise adoption rate was below expectations, and its stock price has dropped 12% year-to-date, the worst of the four. Guggenheim analyst John DiFucci estimates Wall Street expects Azure’s growth this quarter to be about 38%, but wrote last week: "This expectation implies a significant jump in new business growth, which seems unlikely."

Stucky says the adoption trend for Microsoft's Copilot will sway the whole software sector's market sentiment this quarter.

Capital flowing back into tech, data centers and related infrastructure

Powell’s "Last Dance", Rate Expectations Priced In

On the same day, the Fed FOMC will conclude its two-day meeting and announce the rate decision. The market has fully priced in keeping rates unchanged in the 3.50%-3.75% range.

After the rate cut in the second half of 2025, the Fed immediately paused, and rising oil prices make the inflation outlook more complex, further pushing back the window for additional rate cuts.

This will also be Powell’s last press conference as Fed Chair. His chairmanship expires May 15; Trump’s nominee for successor, Waller, is expected to be confirmed by the Senate before the Fed’s mid-June meeting. The biggest suspense currently is whether Powell will announce he will remain as a Fed board member after stepping down as chair.

Geopolitical Risk: Strait of Hormuz Impacts AI Supply Chain

Geopolitical tensions add an extra variable to this day. The blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has a direct impact on global energy flows and supply chains, and data center supply chains are also affected.

Moody’s analyst Terrence Dennehy specifically pointed out in last week's report that Middle East conflicts pose "supply risks" to the helium market. “Helium is crucial in several semiconductor manufacturing steps—including cooling, carrier gases and leak detection—and there is no effective substitute,” Dennehy wrote.

Northwestern Mutual's Stucky also said that it’s not impossible that the four companies may further raise their capital expenditure forecasts, which could spark a new round of market concerns over excessive AI investment.

After Earnings, How Will the Market Price?

These earnings are more like a filter point, rather than an on-off switch.

Wallstreetcn mentioned that the AI theme shows no sign of ending; capital is still flowing in. But the logic of pricing in the market is bifurcating: companies that realize returns faster, have harder orders, and sturdier profits will continue to get premiums; companies with huge investment but unclear return paths will see more stock price volatility.

The semiconductor, server, network device and data center equipment industrial chain still directly follows the big companies’ investments. Recently software and chips have diverged, indicating that the market is starting to gather at points closer to orders and infrastructure within this theme. If the four earnings continue to confirm demand and capital expenditure strength, this divergence will only get more obvious.

On earnings day, the market’s key questions are: will full-year capital expenditure guidance be raised again, can cloud business growth keep rising, will AI-related income be disclosed more clearly, and will margins and cash flow see more visible pressure.

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