Google / Alphabet Holdings released its first fiscal quarter earnings report after closing bell tonight, posting earnings of $7.35 per share on $18.7 billion in revenue, a 13% year over year increase. Analysts had been expecting earnings of $7.21 per share and $18.53 billion in revenue. In last year’s third quarter, the digital ad giant posted earnings of $6.35 per share and $16.52 billion in revenue.
Google’s earnings rise
Alphabet’s reported earnings were $5.73 per share, compared to last year’s $3.98 per share. Google Websites revenues climbed 16% year over year, while Google Network Members’ websites revenue climbed 4%. Total ad revenue rose 13% to $16.78 billion. Other revenues were $1.9 billion for the quarter.
Google’s aggregate paid clicks increased 23%, while paid clicks on Google Websites rose 35%. Paid clicks on Google Network Members’ websites fell 5%. Cost per click on Google websites fell 16%, while aggregate cost per click declined 11%. Cost per click on Google Network Members’ websites fell 4%.
Traffic acquisition costs rose to $2.5 billion, making up 21% of total advertising revenues, compared to last year’s 23% of ad revenue. Other cost of revenues were roughly flat with last year at $3.47 billion, making up 19% of total ad revenues.
Google reports under new structure
This marked Google’s first earnings report with its new organization under the parent company Alphabet Holdings. However, tonight’s report didn’t look much different than previous earnings reports. The search giant separated its core digital ad business from its moonshot projects to give investors better transparency into how its various businesses are faring. Analysts have been harping on this restructuring since Google announced it, so there was a lot of anticipation going into tonight’s earnings report.
Alphabet said tonight that management is introducing the new reporting structure in phases. The company said for financial reporting purposes, the reorganization will likely result in Google being reported as a single segment and all the other Alphabet businesses combined under Other Bets in the next earnings report.
Shares of Alphabet / Google soared in after-hours trades, climbing as much as 9.23% to $743.98 per share.
