mark zuckerberg
Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg testifies before the House Financial Services Committee in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill October 23, 2019 in Washington, DC.
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Facebook announced better-than-expected revenue Thursday for its third-quarter earnings, but saw a decline in its active users in the US over the past three months.

Facebook generated around $21.5 billion in revenue in Q3 2020, up 22% year-on-year. The positive revenue results show the company is starting to recover from the coronavirus-related economic downturn.

Although the coronavirus pandemic initially signaled a slowdown in digital advertising, the recovering economy has shown a reversed course in recent months for platforms like Facebook whose revenue is heavily based on ad spending.

Facebook’s userbase seems to have slowed growth in Q3, according to Facebook’s numbers. The platform saw a rare decrease in its number of daily- and monthly- active users in the US and Canada in Q3.

Here are the key numbers, as well as what Wall Street was expecting:

  • Revenue: $21.47 billion, up 22% year-on-year ($19.84 billion expected)
  • Daily Active Users: 1.82 billion, up 12% year-on-year (1.78 billion expected)
  • Monthly Active Users: 2.74 billion, up 12% year-on-year (2.70 billion expected)
  • Earnings Per Share (EPS) GAAP: $2.71 ($1.91 expected)

Facebook is just one of the major tech companies, alongside Amazon, Apple, and Alphabet, reporting their third-quarter earnings Thursday. Last week, Snap was among the first Silicon Valley players to reveal its revenue and user numbers for Q3, and its better-than-expected results may help to inspire optimism in the numbers to come down the line.

Nevertheless, Facebook is still grappling with criticism it's received over its handling of political content on the platform with less than a week before Election Day. Facebook did face off against a mass advertiser boycott over its policies in Q2 and Q3, but it's unclear whether the movement had a significant detrimental impact on the company's revenue.

Last quarter, Facebook revealed it officially crossed the benchmark of 3 billion monthly users across its family of apps, which includes Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger.

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