Google rakes in £124bn – but shares still slide 3pc

GOOGLE owner ow Alphabet posted disappoint disappointing fourth-quarter results last night, undershooting analysts’ est estimates.

Shares in the internet giant, which also o owns You Tube, slipped 3.5pc in aft after-hours trading following lowing Alphabet’s Alph results release.

The compa company pulled in revenue of £35bn in the t final three months of 2019 – less than the £35.6bn analysts lysts had pre predicted.

However total revenue for the year w was up 18pc to an eyewatering watering £124bn, and profits reached £13 £13bn.

The numb numbers came as a disappointment pointment for Sundar Pichai, Alphabet’s new chief executive who formally formal took over in December. ber. He ste stepped up to the plate after found founders Larry Page and Sergey Bri Brin decided to vacate their roles as chief executive and preside president.

But invest investors who hoped Pichai would erase some of the opacity which has shrouded Alphabet’s results for years did receive some consolation. For the first time, Alphabet broke out numbers for its You Tube and Cloud businesses.

Adverts on You Tube, one of Google’s key divisions, generated £11.5bn of revenues in 2019 – up from £8.5m a year earlier.

And Google’s cloud division – which it wants to build up to rival Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services – pulled in £6.7bn, up from £4.4bn.

Pichai said: ‘I’m really pleased with our continued progress in Search and in building two of our newer growth areas — You Tube, already at $15bn in annual ad revenue, and Cloud, which is now on a $10bn revenue run rate.’

Alphabet recently became one of the few listed companies to pass the $1trillion valuation mark.