Facebook grows profit on new apps, ads

Facebook surpassed expectations on all fronts in the second quarter, growing not just profit and revenue but its alreadymassive user base, mobile advertising and usage of its "family" of non-Facebook apps like Instagram and WhatsApp.

The world's largest online social network said Wednesday that it had 1.31 billion people monthly mobile users as of June 30, up 23 per cent from a year earlier. It reached 1.49 billion monthly users, up 13 per cent from a year earlier. Facebook also had 968 million daily active users overall and 844 million on mobile devices.

"Once again Facebook has proven its ability to attract and retain users. It's particularly impressive that users are more engaged than ever before that the percentage of monthly users who visit every day continues to grow," said Forrester Research analyst Nate Elliott.

That's in contrast to Twitter, which continues to worry investors with stalling user growth.

Facebook's mobile advertising represented 76 per cent of the total advertising revenue during the April-June period, proof that the company continues to attract advertisers to where its users are on smartphones and other hand-held gadgets. That's up from 62 per cent a year earlier.