Google proposes stock split as profit soars

Google on Thursday posted a quarterly profit of $2.89 billion and said its board is backing a proposal for a stock split. Google revenue in the quarter ended March 31 was $10.65 billion, a 24 percent jump from the same period last year. The California company's nearly $3 billion in net income for the quarter was more than a $1 billion higher than the first quarter of last year, according to Google. "Google had another great quarter," said company co-founder and chief executive Larry Page. "We also saw tremendous momentum from the big bets we've made in products like Android, Chrome and YouTube." Google's founders said the board is supporting a plan to create a new class of non-voting stock that would be doled out in the form of dividends to existing shareholders. The plan, according to Page, is to give investors a long-desired two-to-one stock split while preventing short-term interests from undermining long-term objectives at the company. "We have protected Google from outside pressures and the temptation to sacrifice future opportunities to meet short-term demands," Page and co-founder Sergey Brin said in a letter to investors. "We have a structure that prevents outside parties from taking over or unduly influencing our management decisions," they continued. "We want to ensure that our corporate structure can sustain these efforts and our desire to improve the world."