Facebook Q2 Earnings Is Strong According To Report, Surpassed Estimates

In case there was any doubt that Facebook is absolutely dominating the social media and advertising industry, the social media company just posted strong earnings for the second quarter. Q2 revenue is at $9.32 billion, which is a 45 percent increase compared to the same time period last year. It beat out estimates, which put earnings at $9.2 billion or a 43 percent increase.

This is the ninth time that Facebook surpassed estimates by analysts and the gains are being fueled by strong ad revenue from the mobile sector, which comprised 87 percent of the total sales for Q2. Following this trajectory, the social media platform could be looking at an annual revenue of $36.29 billion for 2017, Forbes reports.

Profit is looking good as well, which stands at $3.89 billion, a 71% increase compared to last year. This totals to about $1.32 per share. Along with everything else, however, expenses also grew during Q2 by 33 percent.

All of these numbers paint a significantly different outcome than what Facebook was warning investors about, with regards to “ad load”. Last year, the company cautioned that the number of ads it can show users in the future will be reduced, which would then lead to lower revenue numbers.

Facebook also made sure to note that expenses are likely to increase throughout the year. This is due to all the data centers that the social media platform aims to build, to support its growing list of users.

Reuters spoke with Facebook’s COF David Wehner about the fantastic growth of the company, and the executive noted how the mobile sector is continuing to fuel the social network’s revenue. With the monetization efforts of Messenger and WhatsApp, investors can only expect more money to pour in down the road.

"In mobile we're continuing to see great strengths," Wehner said. "We're seeing more and more ad dollars getting allocated to mobile, and we think that trend will continue.”