Alibaba growth fuels surge in Yahoo shares

Alibaba to Yahoo's rescue — again.

Shares of Yahoo jumped more than 11% in after-hours trading off big revenue gains from Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba.

For the first quarter, Yahoo's net revenue, excluding traffic acquisition costs (TAC), reached $1.09 billion, up 1% compared with the same quarter last year. Earnings per share finished flat compared with last year, at 38 cents.

The company was forecast to generate first-quarter revenue of $1.08 billion and finish with earnings per share of 37 cents.

But it was Alibaba's 66% surge in revenue that dazzled investors. Macquarie's Ben Schachter says Alibaba's "phenomenal" growth is surprising, since the company — of which Yahoo owns a 24% stake — had shown signs of a slowdown.

"Basically, they had a pretty massive acceleration," says Schachter. Yahoo reports Alibaba also more than doubled its net income.

Last month, Alibaba announced plans to file an initial public offering in the U.S., trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

Schachter says Yahoo's search business "continues to perform well," pulling in $445 million for the quarter, a 5% boost from last year.

Despite the modest results, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer said in a statement that she is "really pleased" with Yahoo's first quarter, noting their revenue figures were the best first-quarter results since 2010.

"While the growth we'd like to see will take multiple years, our modest growth is a good start," said Mayer during Yahoo's earnings conference call.

On mobile, Mayer says the company boasts 430 million monthly active users of its products, a 30% jump year over year.

Follow Brett Molina on Twitter: @bam923.