Alphabet announced yesterday evening the financial results of the fourth fiscal quarter 2019 which represent among other things the first quarterly report since Sundar Pichai became CEO of Alphabet next to the same position he already holds in Google. During the reporting period, Alphabet had revenues of $ 46.07 billion with earnings per share of $ 15.35: the revenue was below estimates by analysts, who had set the bar at 46.94 billion dollars, while profits were well above: the Wall Street consensus had in fact raised around $ 12.53 in earnings per share.
"Our investments in deep computing, artificial intelligence, ambient computing and cloud computing have provided a solid foundation for continued growth and new opportunities within Alphabet," said Pichai.
The presentation of the quarterly results of particular importance this time because Alphabet has finally decided to publicly declare the numbers of two key sectors of its turnover: YouTube and Google Cloud. The video platform generated $ 15 billion in advertising revenue in 2019, up 36% from the $ 11 billion raised in 2018, while Google Cloud generated $ 8.9 billion in revenue, up 53% over to 5.8 billion in 2018.
During the presentation of the results Pichai also delved into some other aspects of YouTube, bringing to light some numbers that the public of investors and analysts had been waiting for for some time. Alphabet's CEO revealed that YouTube Music and Premium now count a total of 20 million paying subscribers, while the service YouTube TV has 2 million subscribers in the US. "If you look at the fact that people consume many goods and services as part of their YouTube experience, then creating better business experiences is also a great opportunity for us," said Pichai. Recall that overall YouTube welcomes about 2 billion visitors per month.
Finally, while not providing detailed numbers, Alphabet did mention one decline in the turnover of consumer devices. Chief Financial Officer Ruth Porat cited "declining hardware revenue" by referring to Google-branded devices that include Pixel phones, Nest Mini smart speakers and Google WiFi routers.