Despite fears that Google was falling off a cliff in the midst of the U.S. recession, the search giant issued its Q1 08 financial results yesterday showing a returned vigor that seemed to defy skeptics. Google posted a 30% rise in year-over-year net income, with this key metric of profitability advancing 9% sequentially.
Straight down the line Google's numbers looked good, although for the first time ever, the majority of Google's revenues (51%) came from overseas, a sign that the results may be masking weakness in domestic revenue.
It's hard to see much else that isn't excellent news for Google. Cash flow from operations jumped by 45% to $1.8 billion, while free cash flow was up 51% to $937 million.
Fears surrounding Google's Q1 08 earnings report were fueled when web metrics firm Comscore said that the company's paid clicks had seriously dropped. Google had the last laugh however.
During the company's earnings call, CEO Eric Schmidt all but said that Comscore needs to fix its methodology. Google said that during Q1 08, paid clicks were up year-over-year by 20% and had increased 4% sequentially.
(Download our updated spreadsheet containing detailed Google financial data from Q1 05 to Q1 08 here. The data is free but you have to register first.)
Update: comScore defends its data in this blog post, noting that its methodology doesn't take into account 1. international sites and 2. affiliate sites. comScore suggests that if you take these two components out of the equation, its data is accurate, which leads to the idea that Google has been hit by the U.S. recession.
Cynthia Brumfield at 11:07 AM|Comments(1)
Google is still not paying attention to verticals. Microsoft is. Have a look at this analysis:
http://sramanamitra.com/2008/04/18/google/
Sramana
Posted by: Sramana Mitra at April 18, 2008 1:26 PM
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