LinkedIn Reports Higher Revenue, More Members
October 27 2016 - 5:30PM
Dow Jones News
Professional online network LinkedIn Corp. posted solid revenue
gains as it lured its members to spend more time on the service, in
what are likely its waning days as an independent company.
In June, Microsoft Corp. announced plans to buy LinkedIn for
$26.2 billion, a deal that is expected to close by the end of the
year.
Third-quarter revenue at LinkedIn rose 23% on the strength of
its talent-solutions division, which helps corporate recruiters
identify job candidates. That segment posted a 24% jump in revenue
to $623 million as LinkedIn added customers and prior customers
boosted spending.
A key reason Microsoft wants to acquire LinkedIn is to weave
data about LinkedIn's members in with its own offerings. That way,
for example, sales representatives using Microsoft's Dynamics
software for managing customer relationships could pick up useful
tidbits of background on potential customers from LinkedIn
data.
That makes LinkedIn's membership a key metric for the software
giant, and it continued to grow in the quarter. LinkedIn now has
467 million members, up 18% from a year earlier. That growth helped
fuel 106 million unique visiting members to the site per month in
the quarter, up 6%. Member page views grew 27%.
Revenue from its marketing-solutions unit rose 26% to $175
million, with about two-thirds coming from "sponsored content" or
ads that appear within users' LinkedIn feeds. Those ads are among
the company's fastest-growing businesses.
At the company's third business unit, premium subscriptions,
revenue rose 17% to $162 million.
Over all, LinkedIn posted a profit of $8.6 million, or 6 cents a
share in the quarter, compared with a year-earlier loss of $47.4
million, or 36 cents a share.
Excluding merger-related transaction costs and some other
expenses, LinkedIn said it would have earned $1.18 a share,
compared with 78 cents on that basis a year earlier. Analysts
expected LinkedIn to report adjusted earnings of 91 cents a share,
according to Thomson Reuters.
Revenue grew to $959.8 million from $779.6 million a year
earlier. Analysts expected LinkedIn to report first-quarter revenue
of $959.35 million.
Shares, which have fallen 16% this year through Thursday's
close, edged 0.1% higher after hours to $188.75.
Write to Jay Greene at Jay.Greene@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
October 27, 2016 17:15 ET (21:15 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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