Facebook continued its expectation-beating winning streak, announcing today, $2.5 billion in revenue and earnings of 31 cents a share for the first quarter of 2014. Analysts were expecting $2.36 billion in revenue with earnings of 24 cents a share. In the first quarter last year, Facebook reported $1.46 billion in revenue and 12 cents a share.
Though top-line revenue was down slightly compared to the company’s $2.59 billion fourth quarter, the total beat expectations for the seventh quarter in a row, or every time since the company’s 2012 IPO.
Facebook reported $2.27 billion in advertising revenue, an 82% increase over last year at this time. Mobile ad revenue led the gains — kicking in 59% percent of the total — continuing the desktop-to-mobile balance shift that first tipped in mobile’s favor last quarter at 53%.
In after-hours trading, Facebook shares, which closed down 2.65% today, are trending higher and have made up all of their earlier loss.
1 Billion Mobile Users
Facebook’s user base continues to grow, especially on mobile devices, where for the first time it surpassed 1 billion monthly active users. That’s an increase of 34% MAUs since last year at this time and 6.8% since Q4.
Overall growth continues also. Monthly active users are at an all-time high of 1.28 billion, up 15% since last year, and in March Facebook had 802 daily active users, an increase of 21% over last year at this time.
“Facebook’s business is strong and growing, and this quarter was a great start to 2014,” said Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder and CEO, in the earnings release. “We’ve made some long term bets on the future while staying focused on executing and improving our core products and business. We’re in great position to continue making progress towards our mission.”
Facebook also reported that CFO David Ebersman is stepping down later this year and will be succeeded by David Wehner, currently the VP of corporate finance and business planning.
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