Google (GOOG) Earnings Estimates To Improve; Report Released On Thursday, Jan. 21

In what will not be a surprise to anyone, internet titan Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) is predicted to have increased its earnings by $1.33 per share, from a 4Q08 showing of $5.10 EPS to an estimated 4Q09 showing of $6.43 EPS.

Google is expected to continually perform, but the recent war over censorship between the company and China might harm Google's overseas prospects in the short term. Google currently has 35.6% of the internet search market in China; leaving the country will deprive the California-based company of a large and growing market.

I think it's a good idea, although it may never happen. Corporate executives are almost always concerned slowly about money, profit, and market share. A leader in the tech industry standing up and refusing to continue to censor search results in one of the few authoritarian countries left in the world is a promising sign (even if Google was rightfully condemned for agreeing to censor results in the first place). Besides, it's not like they were getting a fair shake anyway. The notoriously-xenophobic Chinese government was likely stacking the deck in favor of Baidu, the domestic Chinese search company with a 58.4% market share.

China represents a lucrative market - but some things are more important than profit. I'm sure I will anger some of the militant, green-blood capitalists here, but Google's better-late-than-never principled stance is a promising example of how earnings reports aren't always the most important things in the world.

With that being said, Google is now denying that they are going to actually leave the country. This is consistent with the belief that this conflict is nothing more than a game of brinkmanship with the Chinese government, and that Google execs never had any intention of leaving in the first place. If this is the truth, I'll be disappointed. I suppose, though, it's just too hard for some companies to say no to a 384 million-strong market.