Clouded Judgement: Hyperscaler Q1 Reports & The AWS April Growth Cliff

AWS, Azure, and Google Cloud reported Q1 2023 results showing divergent trajectories: Azure maintained 31% growth with improving tone suggesting optimization headwinds may be abating, while AWS reported 16% growth but immediately revealed a severe April slowdown to 11%, indicating consumption trend deterioration persists. The article argues that AWS's guidance shock undermines the narrative of cloud growth re-acceleration and pushes potential market bottom to 2024, with broader implications for SaaS valuations and forecast reliability.