Alphabet shares slump in after-hours despite top and bottom line beats

Google parent company Alphabet saw shares drop in after-hours trading despite beating estimates on earnings and revenues.

Alphabet turned in earnings of $8.95bn, or $12.77 each on a per share basis, well ahead of the $10.82 estimated by analysts, and revenues grew 21.5% to $39.28bn - also ahead of the $38.93bn projected by those on the Street.

Advertising revenues across Google search and YouTube during the busy holiday shopping period grew 20% year-on-year to $32.6bn.

Traffic acquisition costs — money Google pays to the likes of Apple in order to be set as their default search engine — shot up 13% quarter-on-quarter to $7.44bn in the three months ended 31 December.

Costs per click on Google dropped 29%.

As of 2140 GMT, Alphabet shares had slid 3.48% to $1,101,75 each.