Microsoft AI bet shows up in finance leases that haven’t yet commenced [Video]

As Microsoft investors get ready for quarterly earnings this month, there’s one particular metric that’s become increasingly important: finance leases.

A finance lease lets a company pay for an asset over years, rather than all upfront. For companies like Microsoft that are building massive data centers to handle artificial intelligence workloads, shareholders have to get used to some big numbers.

In July, Microsoft told investors in a footnote of its annual report that finance leases that had not yet begun had soared to $108.4 billion, up $20.6 billion from the quarter before, and nearly $100 billion higher than two years earlier. Leases will commence between the 2025 and 2030 fiscal years, and will run for up to 20 years, the filing said.

Overall, Microsoft made $19 billion in capital expenditures in the latest quarter. The total, which includes assets acquired under finance leases, was up from $14 billion in the March quarter and was as …