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Microsoft's first loss in 26 yrs
Microsoft posted its first quarterly loss in its 26 years as a public company on Thursday as it declared a struggling online ad business a bust and prepared for one of the biggest product updates in its history.
Microsoft posted its first quarterly loss in its 26 years as a public company on Thursday as it declared a struggling online ad business a bust and prepared for one of the biggest product updates in its history.
Internet search giant Google earnings, on the other hand, hit analysts' target as refinements to the company's internet search technology lured more Web surfers to click on its revenue-producing ads.
Including the write-down on aQuantive, Microsoft booked a $492-million loss in the fourth quarter against $5.9 billion a year ago.
Revenue rose 4% to $19 billion.
"The quarter was pretty much in line across major segments of the business," Nomura analyst Rick Sherlund said.
Chief financial officer Peter Klein told analysts that for the coming year, "We expect Windows revenue to be roughly in line with the PC market" which it said was flat in the last quarter and is expected to continue that way in the three months through September.
Google earned $2.8 billion during the three months ended June compared to $2.5 billion a year ago. The earnings would have been $10per share, if not for Google's accounting costs for employee stock compensation and the Motorola deal.
Revenue climbed 35% from last year to $12 billion.
If not for Motorola, revenue would have increased 21%. That would have been Google's slowest rate of revenue growth since the fourth quarter of 2009 when the company was just starting to recover from the Great Recession.
The uncertainty caused by heavy government debt burdens in Europe also contributed to "somewhat difficult" conditions, Google chief financial officer Patrick Pichette told analysts.
