Baidu (NASDAQ:BIDU) shares popped Tuesday after the Chinese tech company reported better-than-expected earnings and revenue for the second quarter.
This was the fastest quarterly year-on-year growth pace in two years, according to Refinitiv data.
Revenue came in at 34.1 billion yuan ($4.7 billion U.S.) versus 33.28 billion yuan expected.
Within Baidu’s core businesses, online marketing revenue rose by 15% to 19.6 billion yuan in the second quarter, and non-online marketing revenue added 12% to 6.8 billion yuan.
Earnings per American Depositary Share on a non-GAAP basis were 22.55 yuan, versus 15.79 yuan in the year-ago period.
“In the second quarter of 2023, Baidu Core accelerated revenue and profit growth, driven by the solid performance of online marketing business and operating leverage,” said CEO Robin Li.
“Generative AI and large language models hold immense transformative power in numerous industries, presenting a significant market opportunity for us,” he said.
Baidu has been making progress with a Chinese-language ChatGPT alternative called Ernie bot, which is open to the public and was launched in March. OpenAI’s wildly popular rival chatbot isn’t easily accessible in the country.
Last week, Baidu announced that five Ernie bot plugins — including ones for quickly converting text to video and for PDF search — would become more widely available to users. Three of the plugins can also be used simultaneously, according to the company.
BIDU shares jumped $1.93, or 1.6%, to $126.85.
