Lower European advertising growth hit Google in 4Q

 Today's session is quiet and it seems traders are taking profit following what has been one of the strongest starts in several years. Euro Stoxx 50 is currently down 0.5 percent.

In a pure earnings party after yesterday's close fromtechnology companies such as Google, IBM, Microsoft and Intel, the search giant Google stood out as the only one to miss earnings as 4Q EPS was 9.5 compared to 10.5 expected, the shares are down 7.1 percent in German trading. The main drivers behind the miss were lower growth in Europe and higher operating expenses as the company is pushing aggressively into mobile advertising.

The old dog Microsoft showed robust earnings with strong demand for their Office software. Both Intel and IBM both guided with higher than expected sales figures which is very positive as we would expect austerity in Europe to weigh more on technology spending.

GE miss on revenue on Europe's growth, US existing home sales to rise?
In pre-market, the world's largest engineering company General Electric reports 4Q EPS of 0.39 beating estimates of 0.38. However on the top line GE misses estimates by USD 2 bn. or five percent due to lower growth in Europe. On a more positive note the company's backlog rose almost five percent from third quarter to USD 200 bn. The shares are down 3.5 percent in pre-market trading.

Later today, US existing home sales in December are expected to climb to 4.65 mn. from 4.42 mn. in November as historically low mortgage rates may have fueled activity.