Snapchat reaches 332 million users, but disappoints on finances

Snap, the company behind Snapchat, has published its financial results for the first quarter of 2022. It’s positive on the user side, but the group disappointed analysts on the financial part.

A disappointment for Snap’s finances

Snapchat now has 332 million users, up 18% year-on-year. For their part, analysts expected 330 million users. The average revenue per user (ARPU) is $3.20. The markets were hoping for a little better, namely $3.25. This still represents an increase of 16.8% over one year.

For finance, Snap had revenue of $1.06 billion. That’s up 38% from the same quarter a year earlier, so it’s not negligible. But analysts expected a little more, namely 1.07 billion dollars. Also, the losses were greater this time, namely $359.62 million, compared to $267.88 million previously. The loss per share was two cents, where analysts were aiming for a loss of one cent per share.

The current quarter should not satisfy the markets either. Snap expects a 20% to 25% increase in revenue. For their part, analysts are hoping for a 28% increase.

“Our first quarter results reflect the underlying dynamics of our business in a challenging operating environment, as we grew our community 18% year-over-year to 332 million, and grew our revenue 38% year-over-year to $1.06 billion for the quarter”said Evan Spiegel, the boss of Snap. “We remain focused on creating value for our growing community, delivering ROI for our advertising partners, and investing in the huge opportunity that augmented reality represents. We look forward to sharing many new products and services at our annual Snap Partner Summit next week.”.

In light of the lower-than-expected financial results, the stock fell 4.36% to $29.42. But it rose after the close of markets to experience a slight gain of 0.68% to 29.62 dollars.