Despite what has been described as an extraordinary year with unusual circumstances by tech mogul Jack Dorsey, his microblogging and social network platform Twitter still saw growth in its fourth quarter earnings of 2020.
Although the company failed to meet Wall Street’s user growth expectations, it still surpassed its earnings and revenue expectations.
Twitter ad revenue grew 31% year over year to $1.15 billion, with total ad engagement growing 35% over the same period. Total mDAUs grew by 5 million from the third quarter to 192 million but fell shy of analysts’ expectations of 193.5 million. The user base was up 26.3% compared to a year ago.
The social media giant said it expects revenue to grow faster than expenses in 2021, assuming the pandemic continues to improve and taking into account an expected “modest impact” from Apple’s upcoming privacy changes to iOS 14. The company warned it expects headcount growth of more than 20% this year, with overall expenses increasing more than 25%, this is according to CNBC.
Dorsey said: “We have a global service. We are also not just dependent upon just news and politics being what drives Twitter, this is why I believe being able to follow topics and interests is so critical and so important.”
Twitter noted that revenue from its Mobile Application Promotion (MAP) offering a part of its direct response ad business, was up 50% year over year in the fourth quarter. The company on Monday announced the launch of its rebuilt MAP product, and said in its earnings report that it should increase their addressable market and diversify their customer base.
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