Yahoo! Inc, the computer company that thinks it’s a media company, turned in second quarter numbers six cents ahead of expectations, and also announced a two for one stock split and a $250m private stock placement with long-time investor Softbank Corp. That should be enough to keep the company’s somewhat absurd evaluation bobbing along nicely for a while. And sure enough, in after hours trading, Yahoo’s stock rose to $202, valuing the company at $11.0bn. The private placement will take Softbank’s stake in Yahoo! to 31%. The Santa Clara-based web content aggregator turned in net losses of $36.0m for the second quarter, but that was after a pre- announced $44.1m charge relating to the acquisition of Viaweb Inc in June. That’s against net losses last year of $23.0m, which included a $21.2m charge. This year, without the charge, the company would have recorded net profits of $8.1m, or 15 cents per share – Wall Street was expecting nine cents per share according to First Call. Revenues were up 192% year-on-year at $41.2m. Page view traffic grew to an average of 115 million a day in June, compared with 95 million three months earlier. For the six months, net losses including the same charge were $31.7m, up from $22.3m in 1997. The registered user base, one of the key factors in the company’s success, rose to 18 million. The company had $147.2m cash and equivalents at the end of the quarter. Yahoo! closed yesterday down $4.8125, or 2.5%, at $186.1875 and reported after the close.
