Facebook Profit Soars On Ad Revenues

(RTTNews) - Facebook Inc. (FB), Wednesday reported a surge in third-quarter profit, as the social networking giant's bottom line continues to be driven by soaring ad revenues. Both earnings and revenues trumped Wall Street expectations.

Menlo Park, California-based Facebook's third-quarter profit surged to $2.38 billion or $0.82 per share from $896 million or $0.31 per share last year.

Adjusted earnings for the quarter rose to $3.17 billion or $1.09 per share from $1.63 billion or $0.57 per share last year. On average, 39 analysts polled by Thomson Reuters estimated earnings of $0.97 per share for the quarter. Analysts' estimates typically exclude one-time items.

Revenues for the quarter surged 56 percent to $7.01 billion from $4.50 billion last year. Analysts had a consensus revenue estimate of $6.92 billion for the quarter.

Daily active users rose 17 percent to 1.18 billion on average for September, while monthly active users increased 16 percent to 1.79 billion. Mobile daily users gained about 22 percent to 1.09 billion on average for September, while mobile monthly users increased 20 percent to 1.66 billion.

Revenues of Facebook, the world's most popular social networking site, continues to surge every quarter as companies and other firms continue to spend heavily to advertise on the social network

Mobile advertising revenues continue to be dominant contributor to ad revenues as it represented 84 percent of advertising revenue for the quarter, up from 78 percent last year. Total advertising revenues surged 59 percent to $6.82 billion.

Total costs and expenses climbed 28 percent to $3.89 billion, as Facebook increased its spending on research and development as well as on marketing.

FB closed Wednesday's trading at $127.17, down $2.33 or 1.80%, on the Nasdaq. The stock, however, gained $0.18 or 0.10% in the after-hours trading.