In the midst of a reputation crisis, the social networking giant generated $ 9.2 billion in net profits in the third quarter. Mark Zuckerberg denounces the “false image” given to his company.
Le Monde with AFP
Criticized, weakened, but in good financial health. Facebook has released $ 9.2 billion (€ 7.9 billion) of net profits in the third quarter of the year, or 17% more than one year ago.
This good news financial intervenes at the heart of the most difficult period to manage for the social networks giant, accused by an alert launcher, NGOs and many authorities to privilege for years the profits at the expense of the safety and health of users.
“We are witnessing a coordinated effort to selectively use internal documents in order to paint a false image of our company,” said the boss Mark Zuckerberg at a conference call at analysts, Monday, October 25.
From July to September, Facebook achieved a turnover of $ 29 billion, slightly below investor expectations, which expected 500 million more. Its title still took nearly 4% during the after-stock electronic exchanges.
The “worse deluge of negative press”
Both networks (Facebook and Instagram) and Messaging (WhatsApp and Messenger) are now frequented by 2.8 billion people every day (11% more than a year ago) and by 3.58 billion of users at least once a month (+ 12%).
What to reassure Wall Street, who looks above all if platforms continue to attract the public, and therefore advertisers. Facebook owns 23.7% of the world’s digital advertising market in 2021, according to Emarketer, just behind its Google neighbor, number one in the sector with 28.6%.
The firm “faces his worst negative press deluge, and it will continue,” said Debra Aho Williamson, an analyst of Emarketer. But for the moment, his income “look as good as expected,” she added.
For more than a month, American newspapers are blocking articles based on “Facebook Files”, thousands of internal documents delivered to the dry, the stock market authority, by Frances Haugen, an alert and old alert launcher Californian group engineer.
In the red thread of the controversy: the social networking giant knew the dangers – toxic content on Instagram for teenagers, disinformation on Facebook that hurts democracy – but chose, in part, to ignore them, for the sake of preserving. its profits.
Reassure investors
This weekend, American daily newspapers have focused on the role of Facebook in the polarization of companies. According to researchers employed by the firm, US and Indian users, with a priori moderate political views, are overexposed by extremist or conspiracy content, due to algorithms seeking to maximize consumer attention, essential engine of the Group growth.
Faced with this new wave of criticism, Facebook defends it by recalling its substantial investments to clean up its platforms, fight against misleading, hateful and problematic content, and support the democratic process, including in languages other than English.
“The reality is that social networks are not the main leaders of these problems and can not repair them alone,” said Mark Zuckerberg.
He also attempted to reassure investors on the main financial worry of the group right now: the last update of the iPhone’s operating system, which gives more control to users on their data confidential and complicates the task for social networks in terms of efficiency measures.
Snap, Snapchat Mother House, released disappointing results last week because of this change, which made his action plunge and trained Facebook’s downwards.
“We believe that we will be able to move forward despite these opposite winds, thanks to the investments we do today,” said Mark Zuckerberg.