Apr 27, 2021 - Economy & Business

Alphabet stock spikes on strong Q1 revenue growth

Photo Illustration by Budrul Chukrut/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images

Google's parent company Alphabet blew past Wall Street expectations on revenue and earnings per share during the first quarter, the tech giant said Tuesday.

Why it matters: Much of that growth can be attributed to YouTube, which grew its revenue by nearly 50% year-over-year last quarter.

  • The company's operating income margin also increased significantly from 19% in Q4 to 30% in Q1.

Details: The company, which started only recently to report revenues for some of its standalone businesses — like Google Cloud and YouTube — showed improvement in sectors other than standard search advertising.

  • YouTube brought in $6 billion for the quarter, more than 10% of its total quarterly revenue. The company revealed some compelling growth m
  • Google's "Other Bets" category, which consists of businesses like Nest and Waymo, jumped $47% year-over-year last quarter.
  • Google's Cloud business brought in $4 billion last quarter, which while slightly shy of Wall Street expectations, was still 5.6% higher than the previous quarter.

Be smart: The company also revealed some compelling growth metrics for its new TikTok rival "Shorts" on YouTube, noting that Shorts had 3.5 billion daily views through the end of April.

By the numbers, per CNBC:

  • Earnings: $26.29 per share vs. $15.82 per share expected
  • Revenue: $55.31 billion vs. $51.70 billion expected
  • Google Cloud revenue: $4.05 billion vs. $4.07 billion, according to FactSet estimates.
  • YouTube ads: $6.01 billion vs. $5.70 billion, according to StreetAccount.
  • Traffic Acquisition Costs (TAC): $9.71 billion  vs. $9.25 billion, according to FactSet estimates.
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