Baidu's AI cloud surge outweighs advertising decline as search giant posts earnings beat

Baidu.com (NASDAQ:BIDU), the Chinese search engine and artificial intelligence group listed on Nasdaq, rose nearly 5% in premarket trading on Monday after first-quarter results showed its fast-growing AI cloud business more than offsetting a sharp decline in its traditional advertising revenue. The company earned an adjusted $1.67 per American depositary share for the March quarter, beating analyst forecasts of $1.60, while revenue of $4.7 billion also came in ahead of the $4.6 billion consensus despite falling 2% year on year.