Twitter Q4 Results: Misses Street estimates!
Revenue - The company reported a revenue of $1.57 billion which is lower than analysts' estimation of $1.58 billion. The revenue was up by 22% YoY.
Earning Per Share - The company reported Earning Per Share at 33 cents which is lower than analysts' expectation of 35 cents. The EPS decreased 13.2% YoY.
Revenue from different segments - The revenue from advertising was up by 22% YoY to $1.41 billion. The US advertising revenue came to $784.7 million, 21% growth YoY. International ad revenues increased 24% year over year to $628.3 million. Data licensing and other revenues increased 15% from the year-ago quarter to $154.3 million.
Ad Engagement - Ad engagements decreased 12% due to a mixed shift toward lower funnel ad formats and 15-second video views, which have a higher cost per engagement (CPE) but lower engagement rates. CPE increased 39%, primarily driven by like-for-like price increases across most ad formats.
User Details - Average monetizable daily active users (mDAU) grew 13% YoY and 3% sequentially to 217 million. The US mDAU was 38%, up 2% both sequentially and QoQ. The average international mDAU was 179 million, rising 15% year over year and 3% sequentially.
Share Buyback - It announced a new $4 billion share buyback program. Half of that will be an accelerated share repurchase with the remaining being repurchased over time.
Other details - Twitter reported costs and expenses of $1.40 billion, up 35% YoY. The cost increased because of higher sales-related expenses, headcount growth, infrastructure costs, and marketing costs.
R&D expenses jumped 50% to $372 million, primarily due to higher personnel-related costs. Sales and marketing expenses increased 39% to $338 million, primarily due to higher marketing expenses, personnel-related costs, and sales commissions.
2022 Outlook - Twitter expects total revenues between $1.17 billion and $1.27 billion for the first quarter of 2022. GAAP operating loss is expected between $225 million and $175 million. For 2022, Twitter expects capital expenditures between $900 million and $950 million.
Target Price - The 25 analysts offering 12-month price forecasts for Twitter Inc have a median target of $50, with a high estimate of $70 and a low estimate of $30.
The share price closed 1.98% lower on Thursday at $37.08 per share.
Twitter Q4 Results Review
Twitter Q4 numbers missed the analyst estimates on earnings, revenue, and user growth. Despite the miss in user growth numbers, CFO Ned Segal said that its previously stated goals of reaching 315 million mDAUs in Q42023 and at least $7.5 billion in revenue in 2023 remained the same.