Facebook’s endless PR crises don’t appear to be hurting its bottom line. The company posted a record $6.9 billion profit for the final three months of 2018 — a jump of 61% from the same period a year earlier and well ahead of Wall Street estimates. Facebook’s revenue for the quarter rose 30% to $16.9 billion, according to its latest earnings report released Wednesday. Its user numbers remain impressive as well. Facebook (FB) now has 1.52 billion people who use the social network every single day, and 2.32 billion who use it every month, both of which are up 9% from the year prior. The broader Facebook audience is even more staggering. Facebook estimates that 2.7 billion people now use Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger or Facebook itself each month. Two billion people use at least one of these services every day. Just as importantly, Facebook actually added daily users in Europe and North America, two closely watched and lucrative markets that had previously been stagnant or occasionally declined. The strong results cap off a brutal year for Facebook. The company earned the ire of users and regulators on both sides of the Atlantic for a growing list of privacy issues, including the Cambridge Analytica data scandaland a massive security breach. The endless wave of negative headlines sparked fears of a possible user and advertiser exodus. But the report suggests these fears may have been overblown. “With these results, Facebook has clearly demonstrated that the challenges of 2018 have not had a… [Read full story]
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