Q4 2018 earnings roundup: Facebook, Qualcomm and Microsoft

It’s that time of the quarter when all the earnings announcements come at once, so here’s a brief look at three US tech heavy-hitters.

Facebook is never too far from the headlines, but this is attention investors won’t be too disappointed in receiving. Facebook’s quarterly figures suggest that while the world might disagree with its ethics, morals and basic decency, we just can’t stop telling people about the snow or posting pictures of a deconstructed Shoreditch coffee.

Over the last three months, total revenues stood at $16.9 billion, a 30% year-on-year jump, while net income jumped 61% to $6.8 billion. We might not trust Facebook, but we can’t stop using it.

Daily Active Users were 1.52 billion on average for December 2018, an increase of 9% year-over-year, while Monthly Active Users were 2.32 billion as of December 31, another 9% increase. Facebook estimates 2.7 billion people now use Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, or Messenger, while 2 billion use at least one of the services once a day.

“Going into 2019, we’re focused on four priorities: first, continue making progress on the major social issues facing the Internet and our company; second, build new experiences that meaningfully improve people’s lives today and set the stage for even bigger improvements in the future; third, keep building our business by supporting the millions of businesses, mostly small businesses, that rely on our services to grow and create jobs; then fourth, communicate more transparently about what we’re doing and the role our services play in the world. And I want to take a minute talk about each of these,” CEO Mark Zuckerberg said during the earnings call.

Qualcomm is another company which is never too far away from the headlines, but for quite different reasons.

The last quarter proved to be another which saw the legal battle with Apple take another incremental step forward, but this does not seem to have weighed too heavily on the business. Over the last three months, the chipmaker beat market expectations and signed a new interim patent contract with Huawei Technologies.

The deal with Huawei is perhaps an important one as it lessons the strain placed on the over-worked Qualcomm legal team. Under the new deal, Huawei will pay $150 million per quarter for three quarters, providing a bit of breathing room as the pair look to rectify a licensing dispute. Qualcomm believes this is less than it is owed but indicated this is progress.

In terms of the figures, the last quarter brought in $4.8 billion, a decline of 20% year-on-year, though net income stood at $1.1 billion. Forecasts for the next quarter see the company offering a range of $4.4 billion and $5.2 billion, meeting analysts’ estimate of $4.80 billion, with the market reacting positively to the news. Revenues might be down, but there is a lot of potential on the horizon.

Finally, onto Microsoft, the only one of this trio which seems to have a positive reputation across the wold.

Satya Nadella might not be the most rock n’ roll CEO on the technology scene right now, but you certainly can’t argue with the results he delivers. Microsoft had another positive three-month period, with the Intelligent Cloud business claiming the plaudits.

“Our strong commercial cloud results reflect our deep and growing partnerships with leading companies in every industry including retail, financial services, and healthcare,” said Nadella. “We are delivering differentiated value across the cloud and edge as we work to earn customer trust every day.”

Total revenues increased 12% to $32.5 billion, while the boost to operating income was 18% as the bean counters revelled in $10.3 billion. Looking at the individual business units, revenues in Productivity and Business Processes was $10.1 billion, up 13% year-on-year, Intelligent Cloud jumped 20% to $9.4 billion and More Personal Computing was up 7% to $13 billion.

You might not want to go clubbing with Nadella, but if he carries on this trajectory he’ll never have to buy a drink again.