Reporting third-quarter results after market close Thursday, Google (GOOG) topped estimates, posting net income that rose to $1.64 billion, or $5.13 a share, from $1.29 billion, or $4.06 a share in the same period last year. Net revenue for the period ended in September rose nearly one percent to $4.38 billion. Excluding items, earnings for the quarter were $5.89 a share. Consensus estimates had been calling for $5.42 a share and $4.24 billion in net revenue. The chart below shows revenue sources within Google (click to enlarge).

Impressive. Seems paid clicks grew 14 percent compared to the same period last year, and four percent compared to the prior period. Cost per click was down six percent year over year, but up five percent sequentially.

“Google had a strong quarter–we saw seven percent year-over-year revenue growth despite the tough economic conditions,” said CEO Eric Schmidt. “While there is a lot of uncertainty about the pace of economic recovery, we believe the worst of the recession is behind us and now feel confident about investing heavily in our future.”

Good to hear. Google’s shares, which have already risen more than 50 percent in the past six months, are on another upward tear. They rose 1.82 percent to $539.27 on the news in after-hours trading.

Earnings call highlights via The Wall Street Journal’s Andrew LaVallee:

4:32: Call starts. The cast is the same as last quarter: Mr. Schmidt, CEO; Patrick Pichette, CFO; Jonathan Rosenberg, SVP of product management; and for the first time, Nikesh Arora, president of global sales operations and business development. But there’s a twist–they’ll be using Google’s moderator to vet questions with voters. They vote on “the most relevant questions,” which go to the Google execs, the operator says.

4:35: “While there’s obviously a lot of uncertainty about the pace of the economic recovery, we believe the worst of the recession is behind us,” Schmidt says.

He adds that Google now has the confidence to invest “heavily” in its future. “It’s all good news from our perspective, at least in looking at the quarter.”

4:37: Says “we want to really get to the perfect search engine” and that many advertisers would like to spend more with Google if the company’s product allow them to do that.

4:38: Schmidt says “we’re open for business in making strategic acquisitions, both large and small.”

4:39: It’s Pichette’s turn. “At a high level, we’re very pleased with our Q3 results,” he says. The quarter benefited from growth in AdSense for content and display initiatives.

4:41: U.S. revenue up 4% to $2.8 billion. U.K. revenue decline affected by foreign exchange as well as ongoing macroeconomic weakness, Pichette says.

4:42: Operating expenses rose from the prior quarter, mostly due to payroll, equipment and facilities-related expenses.

“We believe the worst of the recession is behind us,” he says.

4:44: Brazil was a standout in Latin America, Arora says. We’re beginning to see signs of recovery in Europe and Africa, particularly Spain. In Asia, China performed strongly as an emerging market.

4:46: Looking at the display-advertising business, those have also shown strong results, he says.

On YouTube, new advertisers and partners are helping with monetization efforts. Ninety percent of the top 50 advertisers have run YouTube campaigns with successful results–recent examples include McDonald’s and Hewlett-Packard.

4:47: YouTube has signed deals with all four major record labels and several independent labels. Earlier today, Google announced a partnership with Channel 4 in the U.K., which will bring full-length programming to the video-sharing site.

4:48: Arora adds a personal shout-out to the sales team.

4:50: Rosenberg calls the new AdWords front-end one of the company’s biggest investments of the year. Advertisers have new reports, can run more efficient campaigns and can get new features faster thanks to the platform, he says.

That’s the conclusion of an NPD survey that suggests that Mac households favor multiplatform environments, buy more gadgets and have the higher income needed to afford them.

“While Apple owners tend to own more computers and more electronics devices, there is also a high correlation among Apple owners and more affluent consumer households,” said NPD’s Stephen Baker. “The average Apple household owns 48 CE devices whereas the average computer household owns about 24.” (See chart below; click to enlarge.)

Not a surprise, really. Presumably, if you can afford to purchase a $1,199 laptop or desktop, you can afford to buy an assortment of other gadgetry to go along with it. A couple of other data points worth noting:

• 66 percent of Mac households own three computers or more, compared to 29 percent of Windows households.
• 63 percent of Mac households own an iPod. The same can be said of only 36 percent of all computer-using households.

Sadly, NPD’s survey didn’t explore how PCs are used in Mac households or how they ended up there in the first place. Are they leftovers from a PC-to-Mac switch? Are they corporate laptops? Entry-level machines for the kids? High-end gaming machines?

The company’s shares spiked, rising about 20 percent to 54 cents on news of the government’s expanded “Cash for Clunkers” program and the positive impact it should have on new car sales and, by extension, new Sirius subscriptions. That analysts had been predicting a second-quarter loss for the satellite radio company, along with the loss of thousands of subscribers, did little to temper enthusiasm. Though it seems to have done so today, now that those predictions have proven true.

Reporting second-quarter earnings this morning, Sirius posted a net loss of $157.3 million, or four cents a share on revenue that rose one percent to $590.8 million. Excluding one-time charges, though, Sirius lost only a penny a share, matching analyst estimates.

As analysts had foreseen, subscriber count slipped again. Sirius ended the quarter with 18.4 million subscribers–a one percent drop from a year ago. All told, the company lost 185,999 net subscribers during the period. And that’s prior to the addition of a $2 royalty fee.

Looking ahead, the satellite radio operator raised its outlook for the year, cautiously optimistic that the car sales that drive subscriptions will pick up in the second half of this year.

“Based on these results we are increasing guidance again and expect to exceed over $400 million in adjusted income from operations during 2009,” CEO Mel Karmazin said in an earnings release. “Growing our revenue in the face of broad declines in the advertising and automotive markets is a remarkable accomplishment, and we are well positioned for a rebound in auto sales.”

Shares in Sirius are trading down 7.41 percent at 50 cents as I write this, which is still 10 times their 52 week low. And, to be fair, they are up almost 10 cents in last 10 trading days and up about 320 percent year-to-date.

Looks like News Corp. was a little too optimistic when the company told investors in May that it expected a decline of around 30 percent in fiscal-year-adjusted operating income.

Reporting earnings this afternoon, the publisher of The Wall Street Journal and this Web site instead posted a decline of 32.5 percent.

And, to think, News Corp. lowered that forecast twice last fall.

Anyway, the company lost $203 million, or eight cents a share, in its fiscal fourth quarter. Revenue fell 10.5 percent to $7.67 billion, dragged down by a decrease in ad revenue and $403 million in impairment charges and $228 million in restructuring costs, both largely attributable to, ahem, “red-hot social networking site” MySpace.

For the quarter, News Corp. swung from $1.1 billion in net income a year ago to a net loss of $203 million. Gruesome. Excluding items, however, it earned 19 cents a share, which beat consensus estimates by a penny. So there’s that.

“I think the worst may be behind us,” News Corp. Chief Rupert Murdoch said during a conference call with analysts. “But there are no clear signs yet of a fast economic recovery.”

Which is pretty much what he said last quarter as well. “I am not an economist…but it is increasingly clear that the worst is over,” Murdoch said back in May. “As you know, I have been uncharacteristically pessimistic in recent calls, though I would argue that it was a well-founded concern. But there are emerging signs in some of our businesses that the days of precipitous decline are done and that revenues are beginning to look healthier.”

Strong results, but sadly ones that don’t suggest much of a change in America’s economic troubles. Nearly two-thirds, or 68 percent, of HP’s revenue came from outside the U.S.

Course, it will be greater still if it adds a few percentage points to Apple’s operating income. And according to Piper Jaffray (PJC) analyst Gene Munster, it will. Between one and three percentage points, specifically. And if it ends up being on the high end of that projection, the App Store could end up generating $1.21 billion in revenues (see chart below).

Now, to be clear, that particular forecast assumes an installed base of 80.8 million active App Store users (iPhone and iPod Touch combined) spending a minimum of $15. A bit optimistic? Perhaps. Certainly, a market of 61.6 million iPhone users by the end of 2009, as the chart below suggests, does seem a bit aggressive. That said, Apple’s sold 6 million of the device’s first iteration in just under a year. And it was peddling them in just six countries.

By the end of 2009, it will be selling them in 70. And at half their original price. So maybe 61.6 million iPhone users and $1.21 billion in App Store revenues is a stretch. And maybe it isn’t.

Roy, I think you’ve got another letter to write. Icahn’s missive in full follows.

Dear Roy:

After reading Yahoo’s press release put out on Friday in response to my letter of that morning, I cannot help but wonder if you even read my letter.

Again, Yahoo keeps repeating misstatements in the hope it will convince its shareholders that these misstatements are valid. I cannot understand why the Yahoo board feels so strongly about its “poison pill” severance plan and why it continues to refuse to rescind it. How can you continue to repeat that your severance plan is in the best interests of shareholders and employees? Indeed, Yahoo!’s own compensation adviser called the severance plan “nuts.” Is it not true, as the shareholder complaint stated, that Microsoft’s CEO earmarked $1.5 billion for employee retention (a benefit you neglected to tell your employees about)? Is it not better to incentivize employees to stay in their jobs than to quit? Instead of just continuing to repeat the mantra that we have made an inaccurate interpretation of your severance plan, why do you refuse to go into detail as to why our interpretation is incorrect? Additionally, a New York paper reported this weekend that “sources close to Microsoft (MSFT) said the severance plan was a ‘big issue’ when deciding what price they could pay for Yahoo.”

In your press release from Friday, you stated again that I do not have a credible plan for Yahoo. Did you even bother to read my letter, which went into great detail on what measures I would ask the new board to take? Ironically, while you keep inquiring about my plans, it is interesting to note that Yahoo’s board has been busy reaping great compensation benefits. Indeed, you made approximately $10,000 per week last year–not bad for a board member. I believe most of your shareholders would be interested in seeing your time sheets–especially in light of the fact that, in my estimation, most of your so-called “plans” over the last few years have been failures. Remember the old adage–those who live in glass houses should not throw stones. Perhaps most importantly, under my plan, I would ask the board to bring in a talented and experienced CEO to replace Jerry Yang and return Jerry to his role as “Chief Yahoo.” It is extremely important to note that Google hired a great operator as a CEO who helped to transform the company into a giant at the expense of Yahoo! According to publicly available financial information, while Google’s income from operations grew 59% per year over the last two years, Yahoo’s income from operations shrank 21%. What was the board doing over this period? Where was their great “plan”? I believe a new CEO with operating experience might well have had and might still have a very salutary impact on Yahoo. I ask again what your great “plan” has been over the last few years. Why did you permit Google (GOOG) to leave you in the dust?

I outlined a number of questions in Friday’s letter. Why don’t you do me the courtesy of answering my questions as I have answered yours?

Sincerely yours,

CARL C. ICAHN

Net income rose 31% on revenue growth of 42% from a year ago, exceeding Wall Street estimates. Overall paid clicks rose 20% in the quarter compared with the period a year earlier. That’s down from 30% growth of the previous quarter, but better much better than the forecasts of, ahem, certain third parties. “Our ongoing innovation in search, ads and apps helped drive healthy growth globally across our product lines, yielding another strong quarter for Google,” said Chief Executive Eric Schmidt. Apparently, the slowing U.S. economy hasn’t had much impact on the company’s business.

Shares of Google soared past the $500 mark in after-hours trading on the news. Seems the company’s historic run is far from over.

The Internet portal will soon begin a “limited” two-week test of Google AdSense with an eye toward a broader search-ad outsourcing arrangement. That said, this tentative first step is by no means a harbinger of a larger deal. “… The testing does not necessarily mean that Yahoo will join the AdSense for Search program or that any further commercial relationship with Google will result,” Yahoo said in a statement.

It certainly doesn’t. Not if Microsoft has anything to say about it. In a hastily issued statement Brad Smith, Microsoft’s general counsel, cried monopoly over the exploratory alliance.”Any definitive agreement between Yahoo! and Google would consolidate over 90 percent of the search advertising market in Google’s hands,” Smith said. “This would make the market far less competitive, in sharp contrast to our own proposal to acquire Yahoo! We will assess closely all of our options. Our proposal remains the only alternative put forward that offers Yahoo! shareholders full and fair value for their shares, gives every shareholder a vote on the future of the company, and enhances choice for content creators, advertisers, and consumers.”