Yahoo Q4 2012 Earnings Beat Estimates: Revenues Finally Up After Four Years

Yahoo announced fourth quarter earnings today under the leadership of Marissa Mayer. This is the first time Yahoo reported a rise in revenue in four years.

The revenue was up 2% year-over-year at $1.35 billion for the fourth quarter and $4.99 billion for the 2012 year. Yahoo’s profits slipped by 22% year-over-year with $190 million for the quarter. This did, however, beat Wall Street estimates, and Yahoo’s stock price is now up almost 4% in after-hours trading.

Search revenues were also up year-over-year with $482 million for the fourth quarter of 2012 compared to $465 million for the fourth quarter of 2011. GAAP search revenue was $1.89 billion for the full year of 2012, a 2 percent increase compared to $1.85 billion for the prior year.

On the search side, Yahoo reported a lift in Paid clicks of approximately 11 percent compared to the fourth quarter of 2011, and increased approximately 8 percent compared to the third quarter of 2012. While Price-per-click increased approximately 1 percent compared to the fourth quarter of 2011, it decreased approximately 2 percent compared to the third quarter of 2012.

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Barry Schwartz

Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry can be followed on social media at @rustybrick, +BarrySchwartz and Facebook. For more background information on Barry, see his full bio and disclosures, click over here.