Yahoo beat Q1 expectations, faces cost pressures (MoneyWatch) Yahoo (YHOO) announced its earnings for the first quarter of 2012. Revenue was $1.22 billion, with revenue after traffic acquisition costs up 1 percent year over year. Net earnings ere up 28 percent. But income from operations was down by 11 percent as costs increased by 2.7 percent. Some of that may be due to restructuring. What provided the increased net earnings (profit) were earnings in equity interests -- Yahoo's partial ownership of other businesses, which likely means its Asian holdings. That increase represented more than 31 percent of the company's net earnings, making the possibility of Yahoo selling off its Asian interests even more significant for the company's future. The market value of Yahoo's partial ownership of Yahoo Japan and Alibaba.com combined is $8.9 billion, or nearly half of the company's total market cap. On the positive front, the company claimed a 7 percent year-over-year increase in unique visitors and a 45 percent jump in cash flow from operations. Free cash flow increased by 250 percent year over year, but was down by 40 percent from the previous quarter. Search revenue after traffic acquisition costs was up 8 percent year over year, but the critical area of display ads, a category of income that Yahoo has depended on as offering its future growth potential, was actually down 4 percent. Yahoo's stock was up about 0.5 percent in after hours trading.