The “pandemic” has been very good to Silicon Valley.
Facebook and Google join Microsoft in reporting significant growth in revenue in the first quarter of 2021 as Americans’ increased reliance on technology amid lockdowns has proven a fertile ground of business opportunity for these tech giants.
Facebook’s stock climbed up to record territory Wednesday thanks to a major spurt in ad revenue.
The company said it earned $9.5 billion, or $3.30 per share, in the January-March period, up 94 percent from $4.9 billion, or $1.71 per share, a year before.
Revenue, meanwhile, grew 48 percent to $26.17 billion from $17.44 billion.
These numbers beat the forecasts of analysts, who were expecting earnings of $2.35 per share and revenue of $23.73 billion. The average price of ads on Facebook also grew, going up 30 percent from a year earlier, while the number of ads increased by 12 percent.
More people have reportedly flocked to Facebook. The company had 2.85 billion monthly users on average in March. That’s up 10 percent from a year earlier. The Facebook family of apps — Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp — had monthly users of 3.45 billion in March. That figure represents the number of people who logged in to at least one of the apps during the month.
Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the company plans to use the extra money to invest more in new areas of potential growth, such as augmented and virtual reality, commerce, business messaging, and content creators.
“I believe that augmented and virtual reality are going to enable a deeper sense of presence and social connection than any existing platform,” Zuckerberg said during a conference call with analysts.
Additionally, Facebook is expanding its e-commerce offerings and the use of its messaging services for businesses while getting into audio, podcasts, and independent publishing similar to Substack.
Google has also reaped the benefits of the “new normal” under COVID-19. According to the U.K. Times, profits at Google-parent Alphabet more than doubled this year due to a major increase in advertising investment from companies attempting to reach customers working online while “social distancing.”
The tech firm beat Wall Street expectations when it saw its revenue jump by 34 percent to $55.31 billion in a record-breaking first quarter, bringing its overall net profits to $17.93 billion.
As Breitbart News notes: “Sales within Alphabet’s Google search business rose by 30 percent to $31.88 billion. YouTube’s advertising revenues increased by 49 percent to $6.01 billion. Google’s fast-growing cloud computing division saw a 46 percent jump in sales, hitting $4.05 billion.”
Alphabet is valued at more than $1.5 trillion, and makes more money from digital advertising than any other company.
The New American also reported this week that Microsoft experienced a surge in profits during Q1 of 2021. According to a report released Tuesday, Microsoft’s profit during the first three months of the year was $14.8 billion, up 38 percent from the same period last year.
The net income of $1.95 per share beat Wall Street expectations. Analysts had only expected Microsoft to earn $1.78 per share on revenue of $41 billion for the first quarter.
The good fortunes for the developer of Windows are due to increased demand for its Azure cloud-computing service, a result of the pandemic.
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella commented, “Over a year into the pandemic, digital adoption curves aren’t slowing down. They’re accelerating and it’s just the beginning.”
Google, Facebook, and Microsoft have been living it large while 97,966 businesses have permanently shut down during the coronavirus outbreak. Often, this devastation on small businesses has been caused, not by the virus itself, but by state and local governments forcing these companies to cease or drastically limit their activities to comply with pandemic precautions.
All of this for a virus that has a 98-percent survivability rate. But then, corporations such as Facebook and Google don’t want anyone spreading facts about the “pandemic” that would have interfered with their newfound profits. Facebook and Google-owned YouTube have been among the major social platforms to censor content that questions the prevailing mainstream narrative about the danger of the virus, or that questions mask usage and the safety of the COVID-19 vaccine.
In other words, the Tech giants have deliberately shaped public opinion in order to prolong the economic conditions that have been so favorable to them.
These companies are enriching themselves and pushing an unapologetic communist agenda — at the expense of working Americans.
