Tweet Sends Twitter Stock Into Tailspin

Financial website sends out lousy earnings results early
By John Johnson,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 28, 2015 3:38 PM CDT
Tweet Sends Twitter Stock Into Tailspin
Twitter's headquarters is pictured in San Francisco.   (AP Photo/Noah Berger)

How ironic: Twitter's stock plunged 18% today because of a tweet. The company was supposed to announce earnings after the close of the market, but the website Selerity tweeted them beforehand, reports the Wall Street Journal. It was bad news: First-quarter revenue was $436 million, about $20 million below estimates, and shares tumbled instantly. Trading was even halted temporarily following the early release of results. Twitter also warned investors that second-quarter revenue will be lower than expected.

"Revenue growth fell slightly short of our expectations due to lower-than-expected contribution from some of our newer direct response products," said Chief Executive Dick Costolo. Those include video functionality, a “while you away” recap feature, instant timelines, and group direct messaging, notes MarketWatch. It wasn't immediately clear how Selerity got the numbers in advance, reports Bloomberg. (More Twitter stories.)

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