Alphabet has just posted its earnings for the fourth quarter of 2017 as well as its year-end earnings for 2017. The company brought in $32.32 billion in the fourth quarter, which represents a 24% increase year-over-year. And for the entire year, Alphabet garnered $110.2 billion in revenue, which was a 23% increase year-over-year. Operating income for the fourth quarter was $7.2 billion, up 24% year-over-year, and net income was a loss of $3 billion. This is largely due to the new tax act that the government signed into law in December.
Breaking down Alphabet’s revenues, Google Properties Revenues accounted for $22 billion. Google Network Members’ properties revenues accounted for $4.9 billion. When it comes to Alphabet’s Other Bets (that includes things like Nest, Waymo, etc), that accounted for $409 million in revenue. But the operating loss for Other Bets was around $916 million for the quarter. Which is less than year ago quarter which topped $1 billion in losses. Alphabet says that the Tax Act that was signed on December 22nd, 2017 forced them to add a tax expense of $9.9 billion in the fourth quarter (which accounts for that loss, despite a huge increase in revenue). When it comes to Alphabet’s ad business, it did see some gains there, above what analysts had expected. On Aggregate Paid Clicks, Alphabet saw a 43% increase year-over year, and on Cost Per Click or CPC, it saw a 14% decline. These both beat analysts expectations but the earnings per share did not beat analysts expectations (expected: $9.98 EPS, actual: $9.70 EPS) and the result is Alphabet’s stock is dropping 5% so far. But that likely won’t last too long, once the earnings call starts and Alphabet’s executives get to talking to analysts and investors.
Alphabet also has some other announcements today, the company’s board of directors has elected John Hennessy as the new chairman of the board. Replacing former Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, who resigned as Alphabet’s chairman back in December. Alphabet’s board has also authorized repurchasing of some of its Class C capital stock. According to Alphabet’s press release today, it is authorized to repurchase up to $8,589,869,056 of that stock. Alphabet has not said when specifically that repurchasing will happen, but it will be done at different times, market permitting.