HispanicBusiness

Facebook appears to have "friended" some Wall Street analysts over its mobile ad prospects.

Shares of Facebook surged 8.1% Monday after two analysts predicted the social network's mobile revenue will jump.

It's the latest signal for Facebook to emerge as a steadily growing business since its disastrous initial public offering and growth concerns.

Facebook shares rose $1.94 to $25.94.

"As soon as they introduced sponsored stories back in June, it was clear that was how they were going to monetize mobile," Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said of the advertising push.

Facebook's sponsored-story ads in news feeds are items that relate to people's "likes," or listed interests.

The round of advertising optimism comes from BTIG analyst Richard Greenfield and Bernstein Research analyst Carlos Kirjner. Greenfield forecasts Facebook's revenue is poised to boom in the fourth quarter because more ads are appearing in the mobile news feeds on its app.

Facebook analyst Kirjner agrees with the premise, saying Facebook is on track to beat consensus estimates for revenue over the next two years. For 2013, Kirjner forecasts the company will report nearly $7 billion in revenue, 9% higher than the $6.4 billion consensus estimate.

For 2014, he expects Facebook will hit revenue of nearly $8.7 billion, besting by 7% the consensus estimate for $8 billion.

Greenfield expects that such news feed ads will be Facebook's main driver of revenue growth.

"Facebook probably can increase the number of ad impressions per user per day with limited chance of seeing material deterioration in user experience," Kirjner said in a note to clients.

For Facebook users, that means a continued onslaught of ads in their news feed. That could rub members the wrong way. The downfall of MySpace came as the company became a Las Vegas-like strip of flashing ads that annoyed users.

In September, Facebook unleashed its Gifts service. The feature, which lets people send gift cards, could unlock new revenue. Starbucks, Magnolia Bakery and 1-800-Flowers were among Facebook's 100 launch partners. Monday, Facebook added iTunes digital gifts.

Shares of Facebook have been slowly gaining ground from a 52-week low of $17.55 on an improved advertising outlook for the company.

Another tech icon, Yahoo, also is enjoying a stock rejuvenation of late. Shares of Yahoo rose 21 cents, or 1%, to $18.76 Monday. The stock touched on a 21/2-year high of $19 in intraday trading. The troubled Internet pioneer's stock is up 20% since former Google executive Marissa Mayer took over as CEO in July.