Google's first-quarter profits topped estimates by hitting $11.58 a share, with its core business doing well and boosted by its search and video properties.
However, sales rose to $11 billion, but didn't meet the analysts' predicted $11.2 billion, Bloomberg reported. While that doesn't sound like much negative in a sea of positive, Bloomberg's headline "Google Sales Miss Estimates as Ad Fees Per Click Fall" seemed to take it in a much darker direction. The search titan's ad-clicks declined 4 percent after another 6 percent decline the quarter before. Part of the reason for Google's good earnings was based on a federal credit that reduced its tax rate to 8 percent versus 18 percent the year before.
Google-owned sites revenue rose 18 percent to $8.64 billion, according to Benjamin Schachter, an analyst at Macquarie Securities USA. “They’re managing to maintain a lot of strength in that core business across geographies," he told Bloomberg.
