Facebook quarterly revenue beats estimates

(Reuters) – Facebook Inc beat analysts’ estimates for quarterly revenue on Thursday, as more businesses used its digital advertising tools to tap a surge in online traffic during the coronavirus pandemic.

Shares of the world’s biggest social network jumped 4% in extended trading.

Revenue growth at Facebook, the world’s second-biggest seller of online ads after Alphabet’s Google , had been cooling even prior to the pandemic as its business matured, although it still came in at more than 20% throughout 2019.

Total revenue rose to $18.69 billion from $16.89 billion in the second quarter ended June 30, beating analysts’ estimate of $17.40 billion, according to IBES data from Refinitiv.

Monthly active users rose to 2.70 billion in the quarter, ahead of estimates of 2.62 billion.

Net income came in at $5.18 billion, or $1.80 per share, compared with $2.62 billion a year earlier, which included a $2 billion charge related to Facebook’s privacy settlement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission.

(Reporting by Katie Paul in San Fransisco and Subrat Patnaik in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel)