GoTo.com soars on 3Q results

GoTo.com Inc. (Nasdaq: GOTO) shot up 23 7/8, or 42 percent, to an all-time high of 81 1/8 Tuesday, one day after it easily surpassed analysts' estimates in its third quarter.

In the quarter, GoTo.com lost $7.6 million, or 18 cents a share, on sales of $8.4 million.

First Call consensus expected GoTo.com, which operates an online marketplace that hooks up consumers and online advertisers, to lose 32 cents a share in the quarter.

The $8.4 million in sales represents a 133 percent improvement from the second quarter when it lost $7 million, or 20 cents a share, on sales of $3.6 million.

In the year-ago quarter, it lost $5.3 million, or 29 cents a share, on sales of $200,000.

"We are very pleased with our third quarter results," said CEO Jeffrey Brewer in a prepared release. "Our ongoing and substantive investment in infrastructure is designed to cost-effectively scale our business model while maintaining a commitment to a high-quality customer experience. I think this quarter's results begin to demonstrate the return on that investment."

In the quarter, paid clicks increased to more than 54 million, up from more than 31 million in the second quarter of 1999. Advertisers paid GoTo an average of 14 cents for each of these introductions during the quarter, up from 11 cents in the second quarter.

GoTo.com closed the quarter with more than 16,000 advertisers, up from 10,000 at the end of the second quarter. GoTo's search results are available at approximately 120,000 network affiliate locations in its Search Syndication Network, increasing from the approximately 86,000 locations reported in the second quarter.

Its shares reached a 52-week high of 69 7/8 in July after trading at a low of 20 in June.

Two of the three analysts following the stock maintain either a "buy" or "strong buy" recommendation.

First Call consensus expects it to lose $1.21 a share in the fiscal year.