By Thomas Halleck - Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) announced Thursday its earnings report for the fourth quarter and 2013 fiscal year. Earnings per share, or EPS, was up to $12.01 on $16.86 billion in revenue, over 10.65 in the year-earlier period. Wall Street analysts polled by Thomson Reuters Eikon were expecting EPS of $12.26 on revenue of $16.75 billion in revenue.
Google posted profits of $4.10 billion in the fourth quarter, up 15 percent over $3.57 billion from the same period in 2012. The search giant continues to offset a slowing decrease in cost-per-clicks with an increase in paid clicks, as it adjusts to a growing mobile and tablet market and slowing PC sales, its core business.
Google’s ad revenue increased, as paid clicks increased 31 percent during 2013, up 13% in Q4. The average cost-per-click, or CPC, decreased 2 percent during the fourth quarter, slowing a decline pattern that saw an 8 percent decreased in the previous quarter.
Motorola Mobility earnings decreased in the fourth quarter, from $1.15 billion to $1.51 billion in the same period of 2012.
Google’s profits increased to $3.41 billion in the final quarter of 2013, up from $3.35 billion in the year-earlier period.
The Mountain View, Cal.-based company will discuss the earnings report in a conference call. Google posts a live stream of the call on YouTube. This report will be updated as Google answers investor questions and discusses the Q4 and full-year earnings for 2013.