Comment on Facebook earnings blow by expectations, sending shares soaring

Powered by advertising and a fast-growing audience, Facebook reported a huge jump in revenue on Wednesday, with CEO Mark Zuckerberg hailing the dawn of a “video-first” era. The Menlo Park company brought in about $6.44 billion in revenue in its second quarter, sending share prices up nearly 7 percent to over $130 in after-hours trading. The company’s profit of $2.1 billion blew past Wall Street projections and quieted fears that increased competition from other social media, like photo- and video-sharing app Snapchat, was stealing away users’ time and attention. Facebook has not made any announcements about how it intends to handle this aspect of live video, or how it will label or treat violent, controversial or potentially upsetting content, such as police shootings. Video ads, which tend to cost more, are becoming a significant revenue source for Facebook, which is working to begin offering 360-degree video on the social network. In Wednesday’s call, Sandberg highlighted how the company was using photo-sharing app Instagram to attract people back to Facebook and capitalize on advertising to users using video on both services. The company did not break out how many advertisers pay for ads on the social network, though Zuckerberg did differentiate Facebook’s approach to video ads from that of Google’s. Facebook will not, Zuckerberg said, put ads at the beginning of videos, a common practice at YouTube, which is owned by Google’s parent company Alphabet.