Twitter losses double
February 9, 2017
Shares in Twitter fell sharply after it reported that its Q4 losses had nearly doubled. The social media service reported a loss of $167 million (€156m) in the final three months of 2016, as against $90 million in the same period a year earlier. There were 319 million active users, 4 per cent up on a year earlier, but ad revenue fell slightly to $638 million.
Q4 revenues were $717 million, 1 per cent up on last year’s $710 million. Revenues and user numbers both fell short of analysts’ expectations. It was the company’s slowest quarterly revenue growth since it became a publicly listed company in November 2013.
Some analysts had expected US President Donald Trump’s widely publicised use of Twitter would give the service a financial boost, but it seems the controversial nature of this user has, if anything, proved toxic – particularly to advertisers. The compnay reported annual revenues up 14 per cent on last year to $2.5 billion. Twitter has now racked up losses of almost $2.8 billion since it floated on the stock market three years ago and the latest figures deal a blow to the company’s plan to turn a profit by the end of 2017.