AOL Sharply Narrows Loss as Huffington Post Grows

AOL (NYSE:AOL) dramatically narrowed its second-quarter loss from a year ago as it continued to drive global advertising revenues and integrated digital news giant The Huffington Post, though Wall Street had been looking for a profit.

The provider of a suite of online entertainment and other services posted on Tuesday a net loss of $11.8 million, or 11 cents a share, compared with a year-ago loss of $1.06 billion, or $10.01 a share.

Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters were expecting a profit of 4 cents a share.

Revenue for the three-month period was $542.2 million, down 8% from $592.2 million a year ago, beating the Streets view of $530.4 million.

AOLs return to global advertising growth for the first time since 2008 reflects the hard work of our team and another meaningful step forward in the comeback of the AOL brand, said Tim Armstrong, the companys chief executive.

By securing new staff and advanced technologies and acquiring and integrating The Huffington Post, AOL is focused on becoming the next great media company for the digital age, Armstrong said.

Unique visitors to The Huffington Post surpassed 30 million and The New York Times (NYSE:NYT) in May, according to data provider comScore. AOL said the digital newspaper surpassed 12 million comments in the second-quarter and 100 million in July since the sites inception.

The operator of web sites such as Moviefone and MapQuest also attributed the results to gains it has made in global advertising revenue. Domestic display revenue climbed 16% and helped lift global display revenue year-over-year for the second straight quarter.