A report that found its way to Reuters this week reveals some interesting financial numbers from privately owned Facebook. The document, which was meant for customers of investment firm Goldman Sachs, says that Facebook made $1.2 billion USD in the first nine months in 2010. The company also raked in $355 million in net income.
The source that leaked the document to Reuters told the new organization the "the financial statements were not audited and offered little detail about how Facebook generates it revenue".
"It just shows you that these business can generate 30 percent to 40 percent, potentially, operating margins," said Ryan Jacob of the Jacob Internet Fund, speaking to Reuters. "They probably did at least $500 million in net income in 2010."
The 101-page memorandum was meant for investors, who Goldman Sachs wants to raise an estimated $1.5 billion from for a future investment in Facebook. The company plans to dump an estimated $450 million of its own funds into Facebook. Goldman Sachs valued Facebook at $50 billion this week.
Comments
Re: Report: Facebook made $355 million Net in 2010
Yeah..
Everything I hear about this IPO leads me to think Goldman Saches is trying to scam investors. The markets are bad enough right now that a lot of risk-adverse investors (i.e. the ones who got us into this mess) are scrambling for something that looks like a sure thing.. facebook is full of buzz so they figure that will be good to invest in. Goldman Saches pumps them up, takes a huge commission, and then probably helps the current facebook owners take that IPO money and use it to invest in blue chip companies and cash out of facebook before it starts to slide.
It is the same basic pattern AOL and MySpace followed... right before they started to decline they had an overvalued IPO and instead of investing the money in their company they turned around and used it to build solid investments in older companies.. so to me this is a sign that the facebook executives believe they have peaked and need to look elsewhere for growth.
Re: Report: Facebook made $355 million Net in 2010
"...says that Facebook made $1.2 billion USD in the first nine months in 2001."
was facebook even around in 2001?
Re: Report: Facebook made $355 million Net in 2010
Nope, they went live in 2004.
The original Reuters piece said
"Facebook earned $355 million in net income in the first nine months of 2010, according to documents distributed by Goldman Sachs, a fraction of the online social network's $50 billion valuation."