Google parent Alphabet posts mixed 4Q results; profit soars

Google parent company Alphabet posted mixed fourth-quarter results on Monday, falling short on Wall Street's expectations for revenue but beating on profit.

The Mountain View, California-based company earned $10.7 billion, or $15.35 per share, in the final three months of 2019. That's up from $8.95 billion, or $12.77 per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Net revenue was $37.6 billion, up from $31.8 billion a year earlier.

Analysts were expecting earnings of $12.49 per share and revenue of $38.4 billion, according to FactSet.

Shares fell more than 4% in after-hours trading after the results came out.

Alphabet makes the majority of its money from selling targeted advertising across the web, apps and Google products including its search engine and video streaming site YouTube. Investors are now also closely watching the growth of Google's cloud business and its aspirations in the healthcare industry. Google agreed to buy the fitness tracker company FitBit in November.

Alphabet disclosed revenue for YouTube and its cloud business for the first time. It said YouTube's advertising revenue was $4.72 billion, up 31% from $3.61 billion a year earlier. Google Cloud revenue grew 53% to $2.61 billion from $1.71 billion a year earlier.

This was Alphabet's first earnings report with Sundar Pichai at the company's helm, following the depature of co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the co-founders of Google, in December. Pichai was head of Google before.

Shares of Alphabet fell $62.60 to $1,420 in after-hours trading. The stock had closed up 3.5% at $1,482.60.