Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg
Social network Facebook’s revenues came in at US$1.58bn for the fourth quarter, up 40pc year-on-year, bringing full-year revenues for 2012 to just over US$5bn. However, profits of US$64m for the fourth quarter were down substantially from US$302m this time last year.
“In 2012, we connected over a billion people and became a mobile company,” said Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook co-founder and CEO.
“We enter 2013 with good momentum and will continue to invest to achieve our mission and become a stronger, more valuable company.”
While Wall Street investors no doubt saw the fall in profits as disappointing, the interesting thing about the results is the kind of company Facebook is becoming – a mobile company.
The social network, which employs almost 500 people in Ireland, generated about 23pc of its Q4 advertising revenue from mobile, that’s up from 14pc in the third quarter.
Overall revenue from advertising was US$1.3bn, up 41pc on last year. Advertising represents 84pc of Facebook’s total revenue.
Other fees, such as payments, generated via games and other online transactions, amounted to US$256m for the quarter.
Monthly active users of the social network rose to 680m, up 57pc year-on-year.
At the end of 2012, Facebook had cash and other assets of US$9.6bn.
