Pershing Square has taken a new position in Microsoft, the size of which will be revealed in a 13F filing later on Friday. The stock is down about 16% so far this year.
Bill Ackman has bought Microsoft. The CEO of Pershing Square said in X on Friday morning that the fund had taken a new position in the software company after its recent share price decline, and the size would be revealed in a regulatory filing later in the day.
Ackman’s stated reasoning was that the market is mispricing the business franchise rather than the AI franchise. Investors have underestimated Microsoft software “given its deeply entrenched role in enterprises and its highly attractive price-to-value proposition,” he wrote, framing the position as a quality play on the installed base rather than a directional decision on Azure capex.
Timing is the essence of business. Microsoft shares are down about 16% so far this year and have traded around $413 since late April, when CFO Amy Hood used the fiscal third quarter results raise full-year capital spending guidance to about $190 billion, well above the roughly $155 billion analysts had forecast.
The results themselves were a success. Azure grew by 40%, AI run rate reached $37 billion, and total revenue exceeded $82.9 billion. Shares fell anyway, in what a widely circulated buy note called The $190 billion investment plan that changed the price of AI.
Ackman directed this play before this year. Pershing Square revealed a new participation in Meta in Februarythree weeks into the latter’s capex-driven liquidation, and Ackman described the position at the time as a “deeply discounted valuation.”
Microsoft’s entry follows the same shape: a mega-cap dragged down by AI spending guidance, framed by Ackman as an opportunity to buy a high-quality franchise at a temporarily reduced multiple.
Funds managing more than $100 million must file Form 13F returns for U.S.-listed positions within 45 days of the end of the quarter, making Friday a busy day for hedge fund reading.
Pershing Square’s latest 13F, covering the December quarter, showed eleven positions and approximately $16 billion in disclosed US holdings concentrated in Brookfield, Uber, Amazon, Alphabet and Meta. Microsoft didn’t show up. Today’s presentation will show whether the company has trimmed some existing names to fund the new one or sized it with cash.
The trade also falls into a broader debate about AI infrastructure. Hyperscalers have committed more than $650 billion for AI capital expenditures throughout 2026, according to combined first-quarter figures from Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Apple, and the market is now weighing the question of when, or if, that spending clearly turns into operating profits.
Ackman, in effect, maintains that the existing business portfolio of Microsoft Office, Windows and Azure is enough to clear the bar, regardless of the optionality of AI.
Microsoft’s deep integration of OpenAI models into Copilot, Azure, and the developer stack has been the dominant narrative in the company’s pricing review for the past three years (TNW has followed the arc). The capex bill is the cost of maintaining that leadership. Ackman’s bet is that the underlying enterprise software business gets less credit than it should.
Pershing Square has not disclosed the position size or average purchase price. The 13F filing is expected later Friday US time.
