Investing

Surprisingly, Twitter Shares Flat for the Week

Douglas A. McIntyre

Published: October 30, 2016 8:59 am

Last Updated: January 13, 2020 1:45 am

After avalanches of news about earnings, failed enthusiasm about a takeover, layoffs, and speculation Twitter Inc.’s (NYSE: TWTR) CEO might depart, the stock ended the week down a little over 1%.

A review

According to Reuters,

Twitter Inc announced Thursday that it would discontinue the video-sharing mobile app Vine, as it moves to cut 9 percent of its workforce worldwide to keep costs down after beating Wall Street quarterly earnings expectations.

While the 9% of people who lost their jobs should really be the story, Vine seemed to get as much attention because of a rabid following.

As for earnings, according to MarketWatch:

Shares of Twitter Inc. TWTR, +1.49% surged 3.4% in premarket trade Thursday, after the social media company beat profit and sales expectations. The net loss for the quarter to Sept. 30 was $102.9 million, or 15 cents a share, compared with a loss of $131.7 million, or 20 cents a share, in the same period a year ago. Excluding non-recurring items, earnings per share came to 13 cents, beating the FactSet consensus of 9 cents. Revenue increased 8% to $616 million, above the FactSet consensus of $603.8 million. Average monthly users rose 3% to 317 million, beating the FactSet consensus of 316.4 million, while daily active users increased 7%.

And, finally, the CEO issue, Bloomberg reports:

Twitter hardly needs more advice. But I am nevertheless giving it some. It’s time for Jack Dorsey to pick one of his two CEO jobs, either Twitter or Square. Or for Twitter’s board to make the decision for him.

Dorsey paring back to one public company CEO post won’t necessarily put Twitter on the right path. But the company is in serious need of a spark, a ray of sunshine, a new reason to believe. A something. Dorsey quitting one of his jobs might help change Twitter’s perception with the public, investors and employees, and it would buy the company some time for a reboot.

All that, and a stock which went nowhere.