Yahoo, which runs the largest web portal, yesterday reported a 22 percent decline in first-quarter profit but met Wall Street expectations, helped by growth in ad sales, reports the New York Times. Revenue was up 34 percent, to $1.57 billion from $1.17 billion in the year-ago period. Branded and search advertising revenue increased 35 percent, to $1.38 billion. Net revenue - sales excluding fees Yahoo pays to advertising partners, rose 33 percent, to $1.09 billion from $821 million.

"Our overall advertising business saw solid growth and our user numbers continued to climb," CEO Terry S. Semel said. Yahoo execs pooh-poohed reports that it was rapidly losing ground to Google in search share. They said new technology being developed to increase advertising search revenue would soon be ready for a phased rollout.

Sales in Yahoo's fee-based services business, including its DSL deals with ISPs AT&T and Verizon, increased 25 percent, to $186 million.