Google-parent Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG), a tech giant trailing the broader market, reports quarterly earnings after the closing bell July 25. Perhaps investors may get some fresh news to give the stock more momentum after a sluggish quarter these past few months.
Several Wall Street analysts have cited the lack of transparency as a main concern with the company last quarter. So, maybe now executives may offer some clarity around earnings trends, whether or not there’s signs of revived growth this time around. We’ll have to see.
GOOGL is expected to report adjusted EPS of $11.30, up from $4.54 in the prior-year quarter, according to third-party consensus analyst estimates. Revenue is projected at $38.17 billion, up 16.9% from $32.6 billion a year ago.
Where Q1 Results Triggered Concerns
Last quarter, GOOGL reported earnings of $11.90 per share, higher than the $10.61 the Street expected. But its revenue of $36.34 billion, which included decelerating ad revenue, fell nearly $1 billion short of expectations.
Alphabet revenue was up 17% year over year in Q1, which is substantial, however it’s off from the more than 20% consistent revenue growth it had been seeing, including 20% growth in the year prior. Furthermore, its ad revenue grew 15%, paling in comparison to the 24% growth the year prior.
It was the slowest sales growth the company has seen since 2015, but executives did not directly address the subject on its conference call. Instead, they focused on pockets of significant growth in the company such as areas of mobile search, cloud and YouTube.
Shares of GOOGL the past quarter have not been up to the torrid pace of the Technology sector. They’re up close to 9% as of July 24, whereas the tech-heavy Nasdaq (COMP) has gained 25% during that same time. Just before its Q1 report, GOOGL was up 24% year to date hitting record highs, so it’s losses since have been significant. Although keep in mind that shares have made some recovery in the last month.
What to Consider Watching in the Numbers
Also, consider watching GOOGL’s traffic acquisition costs, which are mainly what it pays companies to be the default search engine or for other ways of generating traffic to its website. In recent years, the company has been able to keep this figure fairly stable, even beating analysts’ expectations last quarter when it reported $6.8 billion for the metric.
Margins, which were lackluster last quarter, may also be in the spotlight. Q1 profit and operating margins shrunk as it invested more in hiring and YouTube as well as data centers. We’ll see whether those costs are continuing to balloon, or whether GOOGL has scaled back there.
Finally, take a look outside of GOOGL’s main search engine business for how its other endeavors like its cloud computing, hardware businesses and new video streaming service Stadia are faring. Or maybe watch for what else it may have in the pipeline, say with driverless cars or other innovations that could drive growth.
Alphabet Options Activity
The options market has priced in an expected share price move of 4.3% in either direction around the earnings release, according to the Market Maker Move™ indicator on the thinkorswim® platform.
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