I think Microsoft just doesn't care about ad-blockers. They probably don't have a strong position on it. If they work it's fine for them, if they don't its also fine.
They need to ship a good browser with Windows, because a lot of their enterprise customers rely heavily on web applications. A lot of Microsoft enterprise applications are browser apps. The purpose of Edge is not primarily web browsing.
In 2024, Microsoft generated 12.58 billion dollars in revenue from advertising, which is nothing to scoff at.
And we also have to look at future opportunities — the share of the advertising market may be small, but they represent THE alternative to Google's ads, including on all alternative search engines.
If they aren't concerned about ads or ad-blockers, then why are they so aggressive about pushing Edge on Windows users? And in the EU, when people first open up the Edge browser, why do they inform people that Edge will share their data with the entire advertising industry?
They need to ship a good browser with Windows, because a lot of their enterprise customers rely heavily on web applications. A lot of Microsoft enterprise applications are browser apps. The purpose of Edge is not primarily web browsing.