Yahoo profit surges on Alibaba divestment, mobile
Yahoo said Tuesday its quarterly profit surged with its sale of shares in Chinese Internet powerhouse Alibaba, and that it was seeing signs of life in its mobile Internet initiatives.
Net profit jumped to $6.8 billion, which included $6.3 billion from its Alibaba shares. But profit was stronger than expected, and pumped up Yahoo shares by 3.1 percent in after-hours trade.
Revenue from operations inched up a percent to $1.15 billion, according to third quarter results welcomed by chief executive Marissa Mayer, who is under pressure to show the company can flourish apart from its lucrative investment in Alibaba.
"We had a good, solid third quarter," Mayer said.
"We achieved this revenue growth through strong growth in our new areas of investment -- mobile, social, native and video -- despite industry headwinds in some of our large, legacy businesses."
More than $200 million in revenue came from mobile devices, with gross revenue from ads served up on devices such as smartphones or tablet computers projected to bring in more than $1.2 billion for Yahoo this year, according to Mayer.
"We have invested deeply in mobile and we are seeing those investments pay off," Mayer said.
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