Google reports weak revenue growth in first pandemic-affected quarter

Alphabet first-quarter earnings offer a glimpse of how the digital ad market has fared amid stay-at-home orders

Google reported its weakest revenue growth in nearly five years in the first quarter as the pandemic-driven recession began to shrivel its advertising sales.

It was the tale of two quarters," Sundar Pichai, Google's chief executive, told investors on a conference call on Tuesday. Typically - strong revenue growth in January and February was undercut by a significant and sudden slowdown in advertising" in March, he said. When I last spoke with you, no one could have imagined how much the world would change - and how quickly."