It isn't often a company's stock soars when its earnings report reveals flat sales and revenue, but that's the scenario for Yahoo thanks to its 24 percent share in Chinese e-commerce player Alibaba.
In an earnings report Tuesday Yahoo revealed Alibaba's revenue spiked 66 percent, hitting $3.06 billion. Yahoo then saw its shares jump 11 percent in after-hours trading.
The Alibaba gains overshadowed the not-so-great news of Yahoo's business, which is described as being 'flat' in traffic revenue and ad sales. While the reported $1.13 billion in revenue was within analyst expectations it represents a 1 percent dip compared to a year ago. And yes, Yahoo sold more ads but to little benefit as the company dropped the price point per ad by 5 percent.
The news comes as CEO Marissa Mayer, now in her second year, is trying to steer her company back to robust days of big ad sales, traffic gains and stature as an industry player.
During the conference call she briefly discussed Yahoo's moves in the video realm, one of four growth targets. Mobile users now account for half of Yahoo's traffic, according to a report that quoted Mayer as stating mobile is showing "nice returns in terms of users, traffic and revenue."
Meanwhile Mayer is also busy trying to expand her board of directors but did not mention any new additions during the earnings call.
Yahoo has five current members, including Mayer, which is about half the number at other top-tier tech players including Facebook, Google and Microsoft. The most recent board members to take leave were media executive Peter Liguori and American Express CMO John Hayes.
Reports claim Mayer is continuing to woo Kleiner Perkins partner Mary Meeker as a director.
