Facebook Fourth Quarter Results Soar; Zuckerberg hits Apple for privacy



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Facebook topped a tumultuous 2020 with rising profits in the last quarter, but the company anticipates challenges in 2021, including an upcoming privacy update from Apple that could limit the social network’s ad targeting capabilities.

Apple’s move drew a rare public rebuke from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who, in a conference call, accused Apple of promoting its own interests, not those of users.

Facebook said its already huge user base grew in the fourth quarter, with people staying at home during the pandemic and reporting income supported by a shift to digital advertising amid economic uncertainty over coronaviruses.

But the company predicted uncertainty for 2021 and said its revenue in the second half of the year could come under significant pressure. Because revenue grew so rapidly in the second half of 2020, the social network might struggle to keep up with that pace.

“It is clear that the pandemic has also continued to help the monthly growth of active Facebook users remain strong in many regions, including the United States and Canada, where prior to the pandemic, user gains had slowed. to a crawl, ”said Debra Aho Williamson, eMarketer analyst. But she noted that the number of daily users in that region has declined, suggesting people in the United States and Canada are moving elsewhere – likely TikTok, which has grown rapidly in 2020.

During the conference call with analysts, Zuckerberg came out balanced, saying Apple was quickly becoming one of Facebook’s “biggest competitors” in part because of its dominance in iPhone messaging. Apple, he said, “has every interest” in using its own mobile platform to interfere with the functioning of competing applications.

Apple will soon ask apps to ask users for permission to collect data about the devices they use and to let advertisements track them across the internet. Facebook pushed back on the changes, saying the rules could reduce what apps can earn by advertising through Facebook’s audience network.

Of course, Apple’s move also threatens Facebook’s own advertising revenue. Zuckerberg, however, focused on what he sees as Apple’s motivations.

“Apple can say they are doing this to help people, but the movements are clearly following their competitive interests,” Zuckerberg said.

Apple, meanwhile, says people should be empowered to have more control over their data. Executives rejected arguments from advertisers and companies like Facebook that the anti-tracking feature will hurt the online advertising industry.

“When invasive tracking is your business model, you tend not to praise transparency and customer choice,” Craig Federighi, Apple’s chief software officer, said in December.

Facebook earned $ 11.22 billion, or $ 3.88 per share, between October and December, well above the $ 3.19 expected by analysts and up 53% from the previous year. Revenue rose 22% to $ 28.07 billion, more than the $ 26.36 billion predicted by analysts, according to a survey by FactSet.

Its monthly user base grew 12% to 2.8 billion. Facebook ended 2020 with 58,604 employees, a 30% increase from the previous year.

While Facebook doesn’t state how much it earns from Instagram, which it owns, eMarketer estimates that the app accounted for 36% of Facebook’s total ad revenue and almost half of its ad revenue in the United States.

Shares of the Menlo Park, Calif., Based company climbed $ 1.23 to $ 273.37 after hours. The share price rose 33% in 2020.

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