Google sees revenue double and profits soar to $343m

by Staff, Brand Republic 22-Jul-05, 10:30

NEW YORK - Google has seen its revenues almost double to $1.38bn (£790m) for the second quarter of the year and reported a profit of $343m, compared with $79m for the same period last year.

However, it was revealed that Google's margins fell from 35.2% in the first quarter to 34.4% this quarter, sending Google's share price down by 6% in after-hours trading to $295.99. Earlier in the day, before the results were unveiled, the share price hit an all-time high of $317.

Google said the leap in revenue was due to strong traffic and advertisers' growing recognition of the internet as an effective advertising medium.

Revenue from the AdSense programme, which delivers ads to partner websites, generated $630m during the quarter, while revenue from Google-owned sites generated $737m.

Eric Schmidt, chief executive officer of Google, said: "We had an excellent quarter. We continued to innovate, we continued to execute and we stayed focused on our users. Google had another solid performance."

During the quarter, Google extended its AdSense programme to include display advertising for the first time. It also introduced a number of new local search options, and sparked rumours that it was planning to introduce its own online payment system to rival eBay-owned PayPal.

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