Why Qihoo 360 Shares Popped

Although we don't believe in timing the market or panicking over market movements, we do like to keep an eye on big changes -- just in case they're material to our investing thesis.

What: Shares of Chinese Internet player Qihoo 360 (NYS: QIHU) popped as much as 18% today after the company reported second-quarter results with a strong third-quarter outlook.

So what: Second-quarter revenue more than doubled to $72.8 million, and adjusted non-GAAP net income also posted a healthy jump to $20.6 million, or $0.17 per share. In the coming quarter, Qihoo 360 forecasts sales between $81 million and $82 million, which would be an increase of between 71% and 73% over last year, and is also higher than the Street forecast of $80.3 million.

Now what: On top of that, Qihoo 360 just launched its own search engine in a bid to challenge dominant Chinese search engine Baidu (NAS: BIDU) , which has been under pressure the past couple days on the news. Qihoo 360's popular Internet browser now also defaults to its own search engine, displacing Google (NAS: GOOG) , which had previously occupied that seat. The company has 272 million monthly active users of its browsers -- ThinkEquity analyst Henry Guo thinks its search opportunities are "significant" in the coming years.

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The article Why Qihoo 360 Shares Popped originally appeared on Fool.com.

Fool contributorEvan Niuowns shares of Baidu.com, but he holds no other position in any company mentioned.Click hereto see his holdings and a short bio. The Motley Fool owns shares of Google and Baidu.com.Motley Fool newsletter serviceshave recommended buying shares of Baidu.com and Google. The Motley Fool has adisclosure policy. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe thatconsidering a diverse range of insightsmakes us better investors. Try any of our Foolish newsletter servicesfree for 30 days.

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