Yahoo! has announced first quarter profits of $542 million (£272 million), up from $142 million in the previous year.
This rise was due mainly to gains in its investment in the parent company of Chinese online company AliBaba.com.
Revenues increased by 9% year on year to $1.82 billion, which was better than had been predicted by analysts.
Yahoo! has been given a deadline of Saturday by Microsoft to enter talks over its $31 per share cash and stock bid.
Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer has warned that he will take his offer directly to shareholders if the Yahoo! board does not start talks (see Microsoft Gives Yahoo! An Ultimatum).
In a conference call to Wall Street analysts last night, Yahoo chief executive Jerry Yang said: “If you take only one thing away from this brief discussion I hope it will be that our board and management are committed to choosing a path to maximise stockholder value, and will not enter into any transaction that does not recognise the full value of this company.”
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