Google Posts Big Jump In Sales

Demonstrating the continued strength of the search-ad market, Google (NSDQ: GOOG) added to its streak of strong quarters Thursday, posting big jumps in both net income and revenue. The company said that its net revenue increased 17 percent to $4.95 billion, compared to $4.22 billion during the same period a year ago; Net income, meanwhile, increased to $1.97 billion, up from $0.38 billion a year ago. Both figures were in line with expectations, and Google’s results were full of signs that things are going even better at a company that had continued to grow even in the midst of the recession. Shareholders, however, were apparently hoping for an even stronger performance, considering that the stock is down about 5 percent right now.

Some highlights:

– Cost-per-click: The average cost-per-click was up five percent. That represents quite a turnaround since the average cost-per-click had been trending downwards over the last several quarters; it was down six percent last quarter, for instance.

– Paid click growth: Paid clicks increased by 13 percent, in line with analyst estimates.

– Google site revenues: Google site revenues increased 16 percent to $4.42 billion.

– Networks revenues: Revenues generated via Google’s AdSense program were up 21 percent to $2.04 billion.

– International revenues: International revenues once again accounted for 53 percent of Google’s business during the quarter.

– Capital expenditures: Capital expenditures increased to $221 million, which was up from $186 million last quarter.

– Employment: And Google’s workforce increased in size after three consecutive quarters of drops. The company said it had 19,835 employees, compared to 19,665 three months ago.