Facebook’s stock is flying high after the world’s biggest social network posted higher revenue from mobile ads and delivered a healthy second-quarter profit that reversed a loss in the same period a year ago.
The results, which come on the heels of weaker-than-expected results from online search leader Google Inc., signal that Facebook’s aggressive push into the mobile advertising market continues to pay off. The company began showing mobile advertisements for the first time last spring. On Wednesday, Facebook said mobile ads accounted for a whopping 41 percent of its total advertising revenue.
The Menlo Park, Calif.-based company’s stock jumped $4.48, or 17 percent, to $30.99 in extended trading. The shares had closed the regular trading session at $26.51. Facebook’s stock priced at $38 when the company went public in May 2012, but hasn’t hit that level since.
“I’m completely surprised,” said Gartner analyst Brian Blau, summing up the sentiments of many investors who’ve watched Facebook’s stock price stagnate over the past year due in large part to concerns about its mobile prospects.
“I was actually thinking that maybe they would have a soft quarter,” he added, citing a softening of display advertising revenue — Facebook’s bread and butter — across the industry. “That seems not to be the case.”
Facebook Inc. earned $333 million, or 13 cents per share, in the April-June period. That’s up from a loss of $157 million, or 8 cents per share, in the same period a year ago. Adjusted earnings were $488 million, or 19 cents per share in the latest quarter, above the 14 cents that analysts were expecting.
Facebook’s revenue grew 53 percent to $1.81 billion from $1.18 billion, well above the $1.62 million that analysts polled by FactSet were expecting. The company has also quickened the pace of its revenue growth. In the first quarter, revenue grew 38 percent and in the fourth quarter of last year, 40 percent.
Jefferies analyst Brian Pitz called the quarter’s results “impressive” and noted that Facebook saw its highest revenue growth since the fourth quarter of 2011, when it was still a private company.
Mobile ad revenue was $655.6 million, or 41 percent of the quarter’s total advertising revenue of $1.6 billion. In the first quarter, mobile accounted for 30 percent of total ad revenue.
“We’ve made good progress growing our community, deepening engagement and delivering strong financial results, especially on mobile,” said CEO Mark Zuckerberg, in a statement. “The work we’ve done to make mobile the best Facebook experience is showing good results and provides us with a solid foundation for the future.”
Research firm eMarketer expects Facebook to increase its mobile advertising revenue more than fourfold to over $2 billion this year. This would give the company a 13 percent share of the global mobile ad market, up from about 5 percent last year.
That said, Google is a distant No. 1 when it comes to mobile ads. EMarketer estimates that the company held a 52 percent share of the global $8.8 billion mobile ad market last year. This year, the firm expects Google’s share to grow to 56 percent.
In a conference call with analysts, Zuckerberg sought to ease concerns that teenagers are growing tired of Facebook and flocking to newer, hipper services such as (Facebook-owned) Instagram.
“Based on our data, that isn’t true,” he said. “It’s difficult to measure this perfectly since some young people lie about their age, but based on the best data we have, we believe we have close to fully penetrated in the U.S. teen demographic for a while, and the number of teens using Facebook on a daily and monthly basis has been steady over the past year and a half.”
Facebook has also been working to increase its international advertising revenue, since most of its users live outside of the United States. The company announced this week that more than 100 million people access Facebook using traditional, non-smart phones in countries like India, Indonesia and the Philippines.
More than 53 percent, or $965 million, of the quarter’s revenue came from outside the U.S. and Canada.
Facebook had 1.15 billion monthly active users as of June 30, up 21 percent from a year ago. The number of monthly mobile users grew 51 percent to 819 million.
Directing Duo Mindcastle Joins Farm League For Commercials and Branded Content
Film company and certified B Corporation Farm League has added directing duo Mindcastle--consisting of Casey Warren and Danielle Krieger--to its roster for U.S. representation spanning commercials and branded content.
Mindcastle has spent a decade building a body of work that takes viewers from energetic anthemic sports campaigns to emotional narrative stories to big worlds layered with CGI and VFX. The common link through each genre is their crafted, highly cinematic visual language and grounded performances from believable heroes.
After developing their cinematic eye through photography, they first began directing when ESPN approached them to create a piece from the NFL draft. This snowballed into travel across the globe for numerous films, commercials and TV shows, and collaborations with talent including Derek Jeter, Floyd Mayweather, and Guillermo del Toro. Mindcastle’s work for Adidas, Questrade and Patron shows the spectrum of their worlds and themes.
In a joint statement, Mindcastle shared, “Farm League’s work has an energy and dynamism to it where it’s not only defined by a strong visual style, but it also captivates your heart. We love the passion and mindset that the Farm League team brings to each project, including their drive to infuse a creative-first ethos into each project. We are incredibly excited to dig in together to continue expanding our roots of memorable and dynamic narratives.”
Tim Lynch (TL), Farm League Founder and EP, commented, “Mindcastle’s passion for telling big, crafted stories struck me immediately. They create worlds that are visually intriguing and grounded in humanistic performances, exactly the balance we seek at Farm League. We can’t wait to see where their vision can go... Read More