My Top Stock Pick in the Internet Space

by George Leong, Profit Confidential

It’s hard to imagine that Facebook, Inc. (NASDAQ:FB) just celebrated its 10th birthday after being launched from the dorm room of CEO Mark Zuckerberg at Harvard University.

Getting into Harvard is difficult on its own, but trying to grow a social media Internet company and pleasing Wall Street at the same time is an even more arduous job.

Yet here we are a decade later, and it looks like Facebook is well on its way as one of the top social media Internet stocks in the world. The next decade, if everything works out, should be exciting times for the company, Zuckerberg, and Facebook shareholders.

I’m impressed with what Facebook has been doing contrary to the soothsayers who said the company was doomed.

The stock is up 134% since my article in which I talked about how the share price was moving higher. (Read “Facebook Does an About-Face: Set to Move Higher?“)

Chart courtesy of www.StockCharts.com

Now it appears the Internet company is firing on all cylinders with its more than one billion subscribers. But, of course, there are questions regarding how many of the site’s one billion subscribers are actually active versus dormant.

At the same time, the company will need to constantly evolve and fend off emerging social media Internet rivals, such as Twitter, Inc. (NASDAQ:TWTR), to stay ahead of the curve. The social media Internet space is highly competitive.

However, the recent 2013 results suggest the company is faring well. Just look at the company’s financials, which are clearly pleasing Wall Street and turning some non-believers into believers:

In 2013, revenues came in at $7.87 billion, up 55% year-over-year, while earnings surfaced at $1.5 billion. Revenue growth in the fourth quarter was 63%.

Yet what makes me most excited about the results was the strong rise in mobile advertising, which I continue to believe will be the key for social media Internet companies going forward.

Facebook reported that its revenues from the mobile advertising area accounted for 53% of the total $2.34 billion from advertising in the fourth quarter. More importantly, that percentage jumped from 23% in the year-ago fourth quarter, which is a good sign.

As for its user base, in all, there were 757 million daily active users in December 2013, up 22% year-over-year. On a monthly basis in December, the average number jumped to 1.23 billion, with the mobile portion at a whopping 945 million, up 39% year-over-year.

My feeling is that as long as Facebook can continue to make money from its users; we can expect the share price to continue to rise for this Internet star.

This article My Top Stock Pick in the Internet Space was originally posted at Profit Confidential