Facebook shares rose 6.7% in after-hours trading on Wednesday.
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Facebook now has 1.71 billion monthly users, up from 1.65 billion in the prior quarter. There’s now 1.71 billion of them globally, marking an increase of 15 percent on the same three-month period a year earlier.
The company is also becoming more efficient as it gets older, bringing in $2.05bn in profits this quarter, compared to $719m a year ago. However, in mobile DAUs and MAUs locked in at 1.03 billion and 1.57 billion, respectively, which denote 22% YoY and 20% YoY expansion. The most lucrative ads are app-install ads and news feed ads shown in Facebook’s mobile app, each of which will chip in more than $8 billion, according to Credit Suisse analysts.
In December 2015 Facebook rolled out its Live video feature for testing, starting with a very small number of users in the US. Zuckerberg this summer outlined a five-year blueprint that includes heavy investment in virtual reality, artificial intelligence and expanded messaging services that all aim to make Facebook the go-to portal for everything online. The research firm estimates Google will take $47.57 billion in search ad revenue in 2016, or 55.2% of the search ad market worldwide. On a daily basis, Facebook is visited by 1.13 billion users. There are only so many people in the world, only so many adjacent businesses to move into.
Facebook’s chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg said, “Facebook won’t break out Instagram revenue yet, but Instagram is making a real contribution”.
“The biggest thing we can do to help people and grow the business is to focus on improving and expanding this already dynamic and large community we have using the Facebook app”.
Total advertising revenues surged 63 percent to $6.24 billion.
Users of its mobile phone apps for Facebook, Instagram and its Messenger service are also spending appreciably more time on them.
Mobile-only MAUs are defined as users who accessed Facebook exclusively through mobile apps or mobile versions of our website, or used our Messenger app, in the last 30 days of the given quarter.
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Even as Facebook celebrates its success, analysts say the company needs to keep an eye on rival Snapchat, which has a fast-growing user base.
