Facebook Revenue Soars and Shares Rise to All Time High in Q3

Facebook announced its third quarter revenues, generating higher than expected rise in earning amidst increasing cost and expenses. Facebook's revenue was generated from a big raise in mobile advertising.

This Q3 as reported by Reuters, Facebook posted surprisingly strong profit and revenue growth, mostly generated from a spike in mobile users and advertising. Such positive results also bring Facebook stock to all-time high, even higher than analysts' estimate. In extended trading, Facebook stock rose 5% to all-time high of $109.34 and net income rose to $891 million. SterneAgee analyst, Arvind Bhatia, told Reuter that Instagram takes part of the Facebook's upside, as Instagram monetization engine has been turned on rapidly. 

Facebook purchased Instagram for S1 billion in 2012 in an attempt to increase its presence in the mobile apps. Instagram was well-known for its excellent mobile app, while Facebook was not. Therefore, purchasing the company founded by Mike Krieger and Kevin Systrom is good deal to increase Facebook's mobile strategy. The result in this quarter showed that Instagram really helped to increase Facebook mobile ad revenue. 

Wall Street Journal also took note of Facebook boost in earning, saying it reflect the company's ability to win new advertisers. Companies are now spending more on digital advertising, especially in social network that become their first choice. Currently, Facebook has 1.5 billion users globally, and successfully take bigger share of digital advertising with 2.5 million advertisers, a growth of 25% since February. Overall, Facebook's ad revenue grow 45.4% to $4.3 billion. Facebook said mobile devices ad accounted for 78% of advertising revenue, an increase from last year's 66%. Although total cost also increased even faster to 68%, reflecting Facebook spending on projects like artificial intelligence and virtual reality. Last year, Facebook purchased a Virtual Reality company, Oculus, to extend their social network experience in the VR environment. This November, Oculus will launch their first social network VR apps called Oculus Social. 

Although majority of its users are in North America and Europe, Facebook also laid their eyes to potential users in Asia, particularly China and India. As Forbes reported, Facebook affirmed its committment to connecting everyone in India and China to its platform. Although China blocked access to Facebook, but Zuckerberg said China is already one of Facebook's biggest advertising markets.

In their announcement of third quarter result, Facebook reported a huge increase in revenue although their cost also increase even more. With net income of $896 million in Q3, adding up their revenue to $4.3 billion. Mobile advertising generated 78% of revenue, showing a successful mobile strategy.