BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (AP) _ MercadoLibre SA (MELI) on Monday reported a loss of $50.6 million in its fourth quarter.

On a per-share basis, the Buenos Aires, Argentina-based company said it had a loss of $1.02.

The results missed Wall Street expectations. The average estimate of five analysts surveyed by Zacks Investment Research was for earnings of 39 cents per share.

The operator of an online marketplace and payments system in Latin America posted revenue of $1.33 billion in the period, beating Street forecasts. Four analysts surveyed by Zacks expected $1.23 billion.

For the year, the company reported that its loss narrowed to $707,000, or 8 cents per share. Revenue was reported as $3.97 billion.

MercadoLibre shares have risen slightly more than 2% since the beginning of the year. In the final minutes of trading on Monday, shares hit $1,713.28, nearly tripling in the last 12 months.

This story was generated by Automated Insights (http://automatedinsights.com/ap) using data from Zacks Investment Research. Access a Zacks stock report on MELI at https://www.zacks.com/ap/MELI

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