April 25, 2024
Today at
22:47
Alphabet, the company above the search engine Google, saw its advertising revenues increase sharply in the last quarter. The tech giant is paying out a cash dividend to shareholders for the first time.
The update from Google parent Alphabet
for the first quarter of 2024 looks good. Sales amounted to $80.5 billion, while analysts expected a figure around $79 billion.
With a turnover of 61 billion dollars, Google’s advertising revenue once again provides the majority of its turnover. Those revenues increased by 15 percent compared to last year. YouTube advertising also earns Alphabet a lot of money, about 8 billion dollars (+21%). Revenues from the cloud division increased by 28 percent compared to last year.
Lower down on the income statement, earnings per share are $1.89, while analysts expected $1.53. “Our first quarter results reflect strong performance from Search, YouTube and Cloud,” it said. A reference to developments in artificial intelligence should no longer be missing in 2024.
‘We are well and truly on our way into the Gemini era (Gemini is Alphabet’s AI model, ed.) and the momentum in our company is good. Our leadership in AI research and infrastructure and our global presence position us well for the next wave of AI innovation.” Alphabet plans to make Gemini available through its cloud platforms, so that customers can use the model for their own applications.
Dividend
In the – albeit volatile – after-hours trading, the share shot up 11 percent. After all, Alphabet also thinks about its shareholders: the company announces a share buyback worth $70 billion, in addition to a dividend of $0.2 per share in cash.
It is only the first time that the tech giant has paid out a cash dividend. From now on, Alphabet wants to have part of its profits flow to shareholders in this way on a quarterly basis.
