Alphabet reported revenue of $74.6 billion in the second quarter of 2023 Tuesday, a 7% increase from the same quarter a year ago, when the tech giant reported $69.7 billion in revenue, signaling the weakening economy’s lack of effect on the company’s advertising business.
Net income came in at $18.4 billion or $1.44 per share, compared to $16 billion and $1.21 in earnings per share a year ago. These results beat Wall Street estimates, with analysts surveyed by Zacks having forecasted earnings of $1.32 per share.
YouTube’s advertising business rebounded, rising from $7.3 billion in the second quarter of 2022 to $7.7 billion in the newly reported quarter. The results mark a reversal of a downward trend in the business in recent quarters.
“There’s exciting momentum across our products and the company, which drove strong results this quarter,” Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet and Google, said. “Our continued leadership in AI and our excellence in engineering and innovation are driving the next evolution of Search and improving all our services.”
As noted in the earnings release, Alphabet and Google’s CFO Ruth Porat is changing roles and will become president and chief investment officer starting Sept. 1. She will serve as CFO until a successor is chosen. In the release, Porat expressed excitement for the new role.
“In her new role, Ruth will strengthen our collaboration with policy makers and shape our corporate investments to have maximum economic impact for people and economies around the world,” Pichai said.
Alphabet’s results come amid a year of shakeups at the company. It cut 12,000 jobs early in the year, joining its big tech cohorts in a wave of downsizing. Amazon, Microsoft and Apple have all reduced their workforces amid concerns about inflation and the effects of rising interest rates.
Also notable for Alphabet was YouTube’s recent move to lift a ban on videos falsely claiming fraud in the 2020 U.S. election. Though it removed considerable content positing that Joe Biden “stole” the 2020 U.S. presidential election from Donald Trump while the ban was live, YouTube changed its stance earlier this year amid preparations for the 2024 presidential race. The company said removing the misinformation was not reducing the risk of real-world harm in any meaningful capacity.
Alphabet also found itself on the legal defensive, with a lawsuit alleging that Google has been stealing Americans’ data for AI training purposes. Google rejected the claims, saying it’s been open about training its AI models on public information and hadn’t done anything to violate American law.
