Facebook Revenue Up 50% Despite Privacy Saga
Despite being embroiled in a data privacy firestorm, Facebook has beat analyst expectations and posted a ~50% increase in Q1 revenue to US$11.97 billion. Net income soared 63% year-on-year to US$5 billion.
Analysts had forecast a quarterly revenue of US$11.41 billion.
The news comes as the social media giant addresses concerns over third-party access to user data, following the Cambridge Analytica scandal and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s recent congressional hearing.
The social media giant notched a quarterly per-share profit of US$1.69, up from US$1.04 the year prior. Analysts had expected a per-share profit of US$1.35.
For the three months to March 31st, Facebook added 70 million monthly users – its overall user base now totals 2.2 billion.
Advertising revenue jumped to US$11.8 billion for the quarter – a whopping 50% increase from the previous corresponding period.
Mobile advertising was the main component of ad revenue – a notable 91%, up from 85% a year ago.
Since its record-high in February, shares in Facebook have dived ~18%.
Following the results, Mark Zuckerberg took to Twitter to affirm the social media giant’s commitment to developing “powerful tools” which are “used for good”: