TLDR
- Microsoft stock rose as much as 4% on Friday, hitting $516.39 in afternoon trading.
- Oppenheimer analyst Brian Schwartz raised his MSFT price target to $570 from $515, keeping an Outperform rating.
- Microsoft merged its consumer and workplace Copilot assistants into one enterprise-focused app.
- The new app is built around three tools: a home chat hub, a coding tool, and an agent called Autopilot.
- Microsoft stock is up 7% year to date, well behind the Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund’s 37% gain.
Microsoft stock climbed on Friday, rising as much as 4% to reach $516.39 in afternoon trading. The move came after Oppenheimer raised its price target on the tech giant and Microsoft rolled out a major overhaul of its Copilot app.
Oppenheimer analyst Brian Schwartz lifted his price target on Microsoft to $570 from $515. He kept his Outperform rating in place. Schwartz pointed to customers increasingly standardizing on Microsoft as their main enterprise AI platform.
Stifel analyst Brad Reback also raised his outlook. He upgraded Microsoft from hold to buy and pushed his price target up to $575 from $530. That target points to roughly 11% upside from Friday’s closing price.
Technology stocks broadly helped lift the market on Friday. The Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund, which holds Microsoft as one of its largest positions, rose 0.8%. The S&P 500 was up a smaller 0.2%.
Microsoft Narrows Its Copilot Focus
Microsoft merged its consumer and workplace Copilot assistants into a single app built for businesses. That move ends the company’s push to build a personal AI companion for everyday users.
Microsoft executive Charles Lamanna explained the thinking at a preview event. He said the company isn’t trying to build a personal companion app, and instead wants to help people get work done.
The redesigned app centers on three tools. A home hub combines chat with task delegation, letting users edit Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files directly inside the app.
A second tool, built on GitHub Copilot technology, lets non-technical staff build apps and workflows using plain language. It runs inside a sandbox that a company’s IT team controls.
The third tool, called Autopilot, acts as a persistent agent living inside a company’s own cloud setup. It can handle multi-step background tasks without constant human input.
A New Way Microsoft Gets Paid
Microsoft’s pricing now follows a split model. Everyday chat use comes with a fixed subscription fee, while longer agentic tasks get billed on a pay-as-you-go basis.
This shift changes how predictable Microsoft’s AI revenue will be. The company has more than 30 million paid Copilot enterprise subscriptions, which gave it a steady, seat-based revenue base.
Usage-based billing ties part of that revenue to how often customers actually run the agent tools. That’s a different setup than counting fixed seats each month.
Not everyone gets Microsoft’s full attention here. Alphabet continues targeting consumer AI users through Gemini, and OpenAI does the same with ChatGPT. Alphabet stock was up 0.68% to $344.70 on Friday.
Microsoft stock has lagged its own sector for most of 2026. Shares are up 7% year to date, compared to a 37% gain for the Technology Select Sector SPDR Fund over the same stretch.
Schwartz flagged some risks alongside his price target increase. He pointed to AI disruption and the possibility that companies pull forward their enterprise tech spending, both of which could weigh on Microsoft’s growth path.
Microsoft’s stock carries a Buy consensus among 55 analysts covering the company, with 14 rating it Strong Buy and 38 rating it Buy. Three analysts rate it Hold.
Microsoft closed Thursday at $497.93 before Friday’s rally. The stock’s 52-week range spans from $348.54 to $549.20.
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