Introduction
Facebook's quarterly report showed another quarter of strong growth, but the report is showing a decrease compared to the last quarter. Revenue, net income, earnings per share, and user metrics are all down.
Facebook's second-quarter results
- Facebook's 42% revenue growth was a deceleration from 49% growth in Q1.
- Earnings-per-share growth of 32% was well below a 63% increase in Q1.
- Facebook's operating expenses were $7.4 billion -- up 50% year over year and up 13% sequentially.
- Facebook's daily active users increased 11% year over year, lower than 13% growth in Q1.
- Monthly active users increased 11% year over year, below 13% growth for the metric in Q1.
- Daily and monthly active users in Europe fell from 282 million and 377 million in Q1 to 279 million and 376 million in Q2, respectively.
This resulted in a 22,68% decline in the price of Facebook's share on the NASDAQ over a single day, as investors are losing confidence.
Bussiness Insider called this the "biggest single-day market cap wipeout in US history".
WHY?
Facebook's daily and monthly active users are declining sequentially in Europe. Why Europe?
Management had warned in its first-quarter earnings call that its user metrics in Europe would face headwinds during the period as a result of the enactment of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in the European Union.
The General Data Protection Regulation 2016/679 is a regulation in EU law on data protection and privacy for all individuals within the European Union and the European Economic Area.
Specifically, management had predicted the GDPR roll-out would lead to "flat to slightly down" sequential growth for European monthly and daily active users.
They are also expecting that this trend will continue. Facebook CFO David Wehner stated:
"Our total revenue growth rates will continue to decelerate in the second half of 2018, and we expect our revenue growth rates to decline by high-single-digit percentages from prior quarters sequentially in both Q3 and Q4."
So judging by those results I am pleased to say that Facebook is losing its battle for dominance as people are gaining knowledge of the censorship and data exploitation conducted by the worlds largest database.
Alternative - Blockchain based social media
This may yet again serve as an example of how people provided with a choice are going to take a better one in the free market, leaving those who are inefficient, expensive or straightforward exploitation obsolete.
This is the blockchain revolution at its finest as disruption has already started! Alternatives like Steemit (+apps like Dtube, Dlive etc) are going to attract those who are not willing to sell their privacy, those who are being censored for speaking the truth, and plus they are going to make money off of their own content!
HOW FRICKIN COOL IS THAT!?
I will use this opportunity to show some gratitude to those who were pioneers in this movement:
Thank you, Satoshi! Thank you to all the developers who made those contributions and commits to the idea of the decentralized world. Thank you to early adopters who supported that vision early one. Thank you, anarchists and cyberpunks for spreading the word. Thank you market speculators that pushed the prices high enough to catch media attention.
And finally, thank you fellow Steemians who are participating and contributing to this particular network!
Love, peace and anarchy!