Facebook’s ad business expected to surge, following Google’s act

Facebook Inc. is expected to post a sharp increase in quarterly revenue and profit as it benefits from a wave of digital ad spending while facing the prospect of Apple Inc.’s privacy changes hampering its ad-targeting capabilities.

The social-media giant’s first-quarter earnings report, due Wednesday afternoon, should reflect the past year’s trend of people spending more time and money online and advertisers redirecting their resources to take advantage of that shift. The parent of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp also likely benefited from an increase in consumers making purchases from brands directly through its apps, analysts say.