Google ads spur profit higher, shares up
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-02-02 08:56

Web search leader Google Inc. on Tuesday posted a sharply higher quarterly profit as revenue doubled, blowing away Wall Street expectations on strong Web search advertising.

Shares in Google jumped 9 percent to a record high after the company reported net income shot up more than seven times from a year earlier, beating estimates by a wide margin.

Web search leader Google Inc. posted a higher quarterly profit on Feb. 1, 2005 as revenue doubled, thanks to strong Web search advertising during the holidays. [Reuters]

The company reported net income of $204.1 million, or 71 cents a share, in the fourth quarter, compared with $27.3 million, or 10 cents a share, a year earlier

Total revenue soared to $1.03 billion from $512.2 million, beating analysts' consensus estimate of $962.4 million, according to Reuters Estimates.

Analysts' average target for net income had been 57 cents a share.

"There was a lot of talk that Google was going to post a strong quarter," said Marc Pado, U.S. market strategist at Cantor Fitzgerald & Co. "People were looking for them to beat, and they did beat."

"Revenue is well ahead of anybody's expectations," said Barry Randall, portfolio manager of the $100 million First American Technology Fund, which owns 4,682 Google shares. "Revenue is the hardest thing -- they got that done anyway."

Randall said the company also appeared to have controlled expenses well.

Google, based in Mountain View, California, went public in mid-August. Shares, which debuted at $85, rallied in after-hours trade following the results to trade at $208.95, compared with their Nasdaq close of $191.90.

The company won users with its elegant technology that took Web search to a new level. But Google is best loved by investors for popularizing its own flavor of Web search advertising, a business that now fuels virtually all of its revenue.

"Prices (for online ads) were being bid higher as more advertisers were moving from offline to online," said Janco Partners analyst Martin Pyykkonen.

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