Media giant News Corporation sees its quarterly profits fall 22% on the back of the sale of the MySpace website.

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Sale of MySpace knocks News Corp

This article titled “Ad revenue at Facebook expected to pass £1bn next year” was written by Mark Sweney, for guardian.co.uk on Friday 13th August 2010 14.31 UTC

Advertising revenue at Facebook is expected to pass the £1bn mark next year for the first time, as rival MySpace is expected to see ad revenues shrink 14%, according to a new report.

Facebook, which has more than 500 million global users, leaving one-time social networking darling MySpace in the shade, is expected to bring in .285bn (£824m) in ad revenue this year.

About 65% of ad revenue is derived from the US market, according to a report from research firm eMarketer. This compares with MySpace, which is owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation, which is estimated to be on target to make 7m this year.

Next year Facebook is forecast to hit .76bn (£1.13bn), with a slightly lower 60% coming from the US market, which means Mark Zuckerberg’s brainchild will have seen ad revenues grow by 165% between 2009 and 2011.

MySpace on the other hand is expected to see ad revenues fall 14% between 2010 and 2011 to 7m.

“Brand advertisers are making Facebook a core buy,” said Debra Aho Williamson, a senior analyst at eMarketer. “Ad spending is building quickly and the mass audience is one that marketers cannot ignore any longer.”

Zuckerberg told the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival in June that “it is almost a guarantee” that Facebook will eventually top 1 billion users, with significant room for further growth in countries including Russia, Japan and China.

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