Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) reported second-quarter financial results after the markets closed on Wednesday, and absolutely blew investors away with stellar earnings this quarter, impressing on both the top and bottom line. Also worth mentioning is that these earnings helped Facebook break through to hit a new all-time high in Thursday trading.
24/7 Wall St. has included some highlights from the earnings report, as well as what analysts are saying after the fact.
The company said that it had $0.97 in earnings per share (EPS) on $6.44 billion in revenue. Consensus analyst estimates from Thomson Reuters had called for $0.82 in EPS on revenue of $6.02 billion. The same period from last year had EPS of $0.50 and $4.04 billion in revenue.
Advertising revenue increased 63% to $6.24 billion in the second quarter, while payment and other fee revenue totaled $197 million, a decrease of 8% from last year. Out of the advertising revenue, mobile advertising comprised 84% of the total, up from 76%.
Coming into this earnings season, many analysts were questioning the market fundamentals and whether the broad markets should be making this rally. Facebook as one of the largest companies on the planet by market cap seems to affirm the idea that this market rally was sound.
Quite a few analysts weighed in on Facebook after the social media giant reported earnings:
- Credit Suisse has an Outperform rating and raised the price target to $154 from $145.
- Needham raised its price target to $150 from $130.
- Baird reiterated an Outperform rating and raised its price target to $155 from $135.
- Oppenheimer has an Outperform rating and raised the price target from $140 to $150.
- Piper Jaffray has an Overweight rating and raised its price target to $185 from $170.
- JMP Securities has a Market Outperform rating and raised target to $165 from $147.
- Canaccord Genuity reiterated a Buy rating and increased the price target from $150 to $160.
- Raymond James raised the price target to $155 from $140.
- RBC Capital Markets reiterated an Outperform rating and raised its target to $170 from $165.
- Deutsche Bank has a Buy rating and raised price target to $170 from $160.
- Cowen reiterated an Outperform rating and raised its price target from $145 to $150.
- Goldman Sachs has a Buy rating and raised price target to $162 from $142.
- Citigroup has a Buy rating and upped its price target to $148 from $141.
- CLSA raised its price target to $180 from $161.
- Jefferies has a Buy rating and raised price target from $160 to $170.
- JPMorgan has a Buy rating and increased its price target to $170 from $161.
- Morgan Stanley has an Overweight rating and raised price target to $150.
Shares of Facebook closed trading at $123.94 on Friday, with a consensus analyst price target of $152.80 and a 52-week trading range of $72.00 to $128.33.
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