Facebook’s revenue climbs 18% as it increases marketing spend by 38%

Facebook’s global revenues for the first quarter of the 2020 calendar year have climbed 18% to US$17.737bn – US$3.527bn of which came from the Asia Pacific region.

During the three months to 31 March, 2020, the social media, technology, data and information company – also responsible for apps including Instagram and WhatsApp – saw its marketing and sales expenses climb to US$2.787bn, a 38% increase on the same period last year.

As a percentage of revenue, marketing and sales costs were also up to 16%. Last quarter, sales and marketing was just 14% of revenue, while in Q1 of last year, it was 13%.

Daily Active Users (DAU) were also up 11% year-on-year, to 1.73bn, the company said.