Facebook Misses Q3 Sales Estimates, But Users Continue To Grow

Facebook, Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) shares are down about 34 percent since its July earnings release, but investors perked up heading into Tuesday's third-quarter release.

Facebook reported earnings of $1.76 per share, beating the $1.47 estimate by 19.7 percent. Sales came in at $13.73 billion against a $13.79-billion estimate — an estimate miss, but a 32-percent year-over-year increase.

Q3 Highlights

• Daily active users averaged 1.49 billion, an increase of 9 percent year-over-year.
• Monthly active users averaged 2.27 billion, an increase of 10 percent year-over-year although analysts excepted 2.29 billion.
• Mobile advertising revenue accounted for 92 percent of advertising, up from 88 percent in Q3 2017.

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Facebook estimates over 2.6 billion people use Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram or Messenger each month, and at least one of the included platforms on a daily basis.

"Our community and business continue to grow quickly, and now more than 2 billion people use at least one of our services every day," said Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder and CEO. "We're building the best services for private messaging and stories, and there are huge opportunities ahead in video and commerce as well."

Facebook shares closed Tuesday up 2.91 percent at $146.22. Shares were up about 1.5 percent in after-hours trading. Editor's note: The stock fell more than 5 percent shortly after the company's conference call began at 5 p.m. ET.

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The Technical Setup Into Facebook's Q3 Earnings Release