Google and Microsoft both reported very good earnings, driving both stock prices up after hours. I like to dive into the ad revenue side, and it looks like Google Ad revenue was up 13% from last year and Microsoft Advertising revenue was up 12% from last year.
And that is good because both companies saw ad revenues increase the previous quarter and the quarter before that.
Google reported total ad sales of $61.66 billion — up from $54.55 billion a year ago.
GOOG Earnings
The Google earnings release (PDF) has Google's revenues of $80.5 billion, up 15% year over year from $69.7 billion. Google's ad revenue specifically was $61.7 billion, up 13% year over year from $54.5 billion. Net income jumped 57% to $23.66 billion, or $1.89 a share, from $15.05 billion, or $1.17 a share, a year earlier.
Here is a chart plotting Google's overall revenue, then ad revenue and then profit over the past several quarters:
Here is the snippet from the earnings report:
Sundar Pichai, CEO, said: “Our results in the first quarter reflect strong performance from Search, YouTube and Cloud. We are well under way with our Gemini era and there’s great momentum across the company. Our leadership in AI research and infrastructure, and our global product footprint, position us well for the next wave of AI innovation.”
Ruth Porat, President and Chief Investment Officer; CFO said: “Our strong financial results for the first quarter reflect revenue strength across the company and ongoing efforts to durably reengineer our cost base. We delivered revenues of $80.5 billion, up 15% year-on-year, and operating margin expansion.”
MSFT Earnings
Microsoft overall revenue was $$61.9 billion a 17% year over year increase, ad revenue was up 12% with net income of $21.9 billion an increase of 20% year over year. Last quarter, Microsoft's ad revenue was up only 8%, so this is a big lift.
Microsoft wrote, "Search and news advertising revenue excluding traffic acquisition costs increased 12%."
Here is the chart showing the percentage growth for Microsoft advertising:
“Microsoft Copilot and Copilot stack are orchestrating a new era of AI transformation, driving better business outcomes across every role and industry," said Satya Nadella, chairman and chief executive officer of Microsoft.
“This quarter Microsoft Cloud revenue was $35.1 billion, up 23% year-over-year, driven by strong execution by our sales teams and partners,” said Amy Hood, executive vice president and chief financial officer of Microsoft.
Also, this:
“Bing reached over 140 million daily active users” 💅https://t.co/vqk8byRPtA
— Michael Schechter (@mikeschechter) April 26, 2024
Google earnings call:
— Kevin_Indig (@Kevin_Indig) April 26, 2024
“based on our testing, we are encouraged that we are seeing an increase in search usage among people who use the new AI overviews as well as increased user satisfaction with the results.”
“There are questions about monetization. And based on our testing so far, I'm comfortable and confident that we'll be able to manage the monetization transition here well as well.”
— Kevin_Indig (@Kevin_Indig) April 26, 2024
Forum discussion at X and WebmasterWorld.