Google has delivered a double-shot of good news to investors, announcing soaring profits and plans for a long-desired stock split that will make its shares easier to trade.

Google reported a profit of $2.89 billion on revenue of $10.65 billion in the quarter ended March 31.

The performance trounced that seen in the same period last year when the California-based company had a net income of $1.8 billion on $8.57 billion in revenue.

“Google had another great quarter,” said company co-founder and chief executive Larry Page. “We also saw tremendous momentum from the big bets we’ve made in products like Android, Chrome and YouTube.”

Google’s founders said the board is supporting a plan to create a new class of non-voting stock that would be doled out in the form of dividends to existing shareholders. The intent is to give investors a long-desired two-to-one stock split while keeping founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin in command.

“We have protected Google from outside pressures and the temptation to sacrifice future opportunities to meet short-term demands,” Mr Page and Mr Brin said in a letter to investors.

“Approval of the stock split by shareholders was considered a foregone conclusion since Google’s co-founders and chairman Eric Schmidt together have controlling interest in the company and support the move.

Google’s stock price has soared since it went public in 2004, but the company shunned splitting shares to appeal to people interested in investing in the firm for the long haul, and let the founders call the shots.