Alphabet, Microsoft Release Closely Watched Results

Google's corporate parent returned to double-digit revenue growth during last year's final quarter, signaling the internet powerhouse has regained its footing even as it grapples with regulatory and competitive threats to its digital empire. The results announced Tuesday by Alphabet Inc. marked the third consecutive quarter of escalating revenue growth for the Mountain View, California, company, with most of the sales coming through Google's dominance of search and online advertising, the AP reports. The rebound followed an unprecedented drop in Google's ad revenue coming out of the pandemic following nearly 20 years of uninterrupted growth.

Even so, Google's ad sales growth lagged the increases in other areas, such as cloud computing and subscriptions to YouTube. That raised concerns that advertisers still are worried about the direction of the economy, causing Alphabet's shares to fall nearly 7% in extended trading, despite fourth-quarter results that exceeded analysts' projections. Alphabet's revenue for the October-December period climbed 13% from the previous year to $86.31 billion. Alphabet earned $20.69 billion, or $1.64 per share, in its most recent quarter, a 52% increase from the same time in the previous year. The robust gain came despite a $1.2 billion charge taken to account for more than 1,000 layoffs that the company has made since the start of this year.

Microsoft, the other tech giant to report results after markets closed Tuesday, said profit for the October-December quarter soared 33%, powered by its significant investments in artificial intelligence technology. The company said that increase largely reflected growth in the company's cloud-computing unit, where Microsoft focuses most of its AI investments, the AP reports. The company reported net income for the quarter of $21.87 billion, or $2.93 per diluted share, beating Wall Street expectations of $2.79 per share. Microsoft posted revenue of $62.02 billion in the quarter, up 18% from $52.75 billion the previous year, also beating expectations. (More Alphabet stories.)