Alphabet Inc (GOOG)

[SeriousMoney]

WOWIE! GOOG back to 500 AH. We can see your sh*t-eating grin from here.

"It's a good time to be a Google bull," said Colin Gillis, an analyst with Canaccord Adams. "The boys delivered."

On Thursday, the company said first-quarter net income rose to $1.31 billion, or $4.12 per diluted share, from $1 billion, or $3.18 per share, in the year-earlier quarter.

Excluding one-time items and stock option expenses, profit was $4.84 a share, ahead of the average Wall Street forecast of $4.53 per share as compiled by Reuters Estimates.

Gross revenue rose 42 percent to $5.19 billion. By contrast, Google's revenue grew at a 63 percent rate in the same quarter a year ago.

Revenue had been expected, on average, to grow 40 percent to $5.13 billion, according to Reuters Estimates.

Traffic acquisition costs -- the cut of advertising revenue Google pays out to affiliated sites that run its ads -- amounted to 29 percent of ad revenue in the first quarter. A year ago, the proportion was 31 percent.

Google shares shot up as much as 11.5 percent to $501 in extended trading from its close of $449.54 on the Nasdaq earlier on Thursday.

http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idINN1740758020080417?rpc=44