Twitter shares fall as growth in user numbers slows down

Twitter Inc reported anaemic user growth during the final three months of last year, sending shares sinking after its first quarterly report as a public company.

Shares dropped more than 10 percent to $58 in after hours trading.

The company reported $243 million in revenue during the fourth quarter, topping investors’ expectations of $218.2 million, on average.

But user growth, a closely watched metric, appeared to falter. It averaged 241 million monthly users, up just 3.8 percent from the previous quarter - the lowest rate since Twitter began disclosing its user figures.

User numbers grew at 10 percent, 7 percent, and 6 percent during the first three quarters of the year, respectively.

Twitter, which held a highly anticipated initial public offering in November at $26 a share, has divided investor opinion in the months since as shares more than doubled to more than $66 despite an absence of news.

Timeline views, a measure of user engagement, dropped sharply from 159 billion to 148 billion in the quarter, signalling that users were refreshing their Twitter accounts less often. (Reuters)