Twitter reports strong Q2 results with revenue climbing 74% from a year ago | ZDNet

Twitter delivered better-than-expected second quarter earnings on Thursday, reporting solid growth in revenue , advertising sales and user numbers.

For the second quarter, Twitter reported first quarter net income of $66 million, or 8 cents a share. On a non-GAAP basis, Twitter’s earnings came to 8 cents per share on revenue of $1.19 billion, up 74% from a year ago. 

Wall Street was expecting Twitter to report non-GAAP earnings of 7 cents a share on revenue of $1.06 billion.

Elsewhere on the balance sheet, Twitter’s Q2 data licensing sales came to $137 million, up 13% from a year ago and its ad revenue climbed 87% year over year to $1.05 billion.

According to Twitter, monetizable daily active users (mDAU) were 206 million in the second quarter, up from 186 million a year ago. 

In the US, the average mDAU tally came 37 million for Q2, compared to 36 million in the same period of the previous year and 38 million in the previous quarter. 

For the third quarter, Twitter projected revenue between $1.22 billion and $1.3 billion with an operating income between a loss of $50 million or break even. Analysts are looking for third quarter revenue of $1.17 billion.

“We delivered better-than-expected performance across all major products and geographies while growing our audience,” said Ned Segal, Twitter’s CFO. “We continued to make significant progress on our direct response and brand products with updated ad formats, improved measurement, and better prediction. We are driving more value for advertisers with our strong push into performance-based advertising and expanded offerings for small and medium-sized businesses.”

Shares of Twitter were up more than 8% after hours.