Turns out Wall Street doesn’t care about Facebook’s data leak if it’s going to keep posting huge advertising revenue.
That’s what we learned on Thursday, with shares of the social network blitzing up 9.06 percent to $174.16 a share, one day after reporting a big Q1 earnings beat. Facebook pulled in nearly $12 billion in revenue during the first quarter — its 12th straight quarter beating revenue expectations — and a company-record $4.9 billion profit.
At the same time, Facebook assuaged some of the fears about a declining user base. A #DeleteFacebook movement gained steam on Twitter shortly after the Cambridge Analytica data leak, when it was revealed last month up to 87 million users had their information unknowingly accessed in 2014.
Celebs like Elon Musk and Will Ferrell axed their Facebook pages, but the scandal appears not to have impacted Facebook at least during the final days of the first quarter, with the company reporting it had gained 1 million daily active users in North America. This was a positive sign for investors, after the social network had lost 1 million domestic users for the first time in its history during the fourth quarter of 2017. Facebook reported 2.2 billion monthly active users — a 13 percent increase year-over-year.
Facebook still has a little bit further to go before reclaiming its pre-Cambridge Analytica standing on Wall Street, however: the company is about $10 a share below where it was in mid-March.
6 Tech Giants Shaking Up News, From Jeff Bezos to Laurene Powell Jobs (Photos)
Tech leaders are increasingly intertwined with the news business. While some want to support old properties, one set out to destroy a new one. Here they are.
Jeff Bezos – Washington Post
The Amazon founder purchased the Washington Post in 2013 for $250 million in cash. President Trump has called the paper the “Amazon Washington Post.”
The Facebook co-founder purchased The New Republic in 2012, becoming executive chairman and publisher. However, he sold the venerable political magazine to Win McCormack in 2016, saying he "underestimated the difficulty of transitioning an old and traditional institution into a digital media company in today’s quickly evolving climate."
The eBay founder is a well-known philanthropist who created First Look Media, a journalism venture behind The Intercept. Inspired by Edward Snowden's leaks. Omidyar teamed up with journalists Glenn Greenwald, Jeremy Scahill and Laura Poitras to launch the website “dedicated to the kind of reporting those disclosures required: fearless, adversarial journalism.”
The PayPal co-founder doesn’t own a news organization, but he makes this list because he essentially ended one -- Gawker -- proving once again the power of an angry billionaire. Thiel secretly bankrolled Hulk Hogan’s sex-tape lawsuit against Gawker Media because he was upset that the website once outed him as gay. Hogan won the defamation lawsuit against the site that sent its parent company into bankruptcy, and Gawker.com is no longer operating.
OK, so Facebook isn’t technically a news organization… yet. However, the company is preparing to launch its much-anticipated lineup of original content later this summer, and there are also signs that it's on the verge of becoming an even bigger media platform.
Campbell Brown, Head of News Partnerships at Facebook, confirmed last week it’s developing a subscription service for publishers willing to post articles directly to Facebook Instant Articles, rather than their native websites.
Tech is increasingly intertwined with news, for better or worse
Tech leaders are increasingly intertwined with the news business. While some want to support old properties, one set out to destroy a new one. Here they are.