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Updated July 30, 2014: Twitter stock (NYSE: TWTR) closed up 1.74% to trade at $38.59 per share ahead of second-quarter 2014 earnings scheduled for release after the bell on Tuesday. Only minutes after release, TWTR stock jumped 30.22% in after-hours trading. On Wednesday, shares traded at $46.97 (up 21.72%) as of 11:30 a.m. EDT.
Analysts surveyed by FactSet predicted Twitter would post a loss of $0.01 a share on $283.4 million in revenue in its Q2 2014, compared with a loss of $0.12 a share on sales of $139.3 million in the year-ago period.
Twitter beat estimates by $0.03 a share and also topped revenue estimates by $29.72 million (a 124.1% gain year over year).
These earnings were different from any other we've seen from Twitter since it went public in November 2013.
You see, on Feb. 5, the microblogging site announced its first-ever earnings as a publicly traded company. It topped Wall Street estimates by $0.03. Revenue of $243 million beat projections by $26.14 million and constituted a 116% increase compared to the same period the year before. Twitter's advertising revenue, which made up 90% of the company's total revenue, came in at $220 million, an increase of 121% year over year; mobile advertising revenue was more than 75% of total advertising revenue.
That day, TWTR stock fell more than 13% in after-hours trading, and opened the next day down 30.35%.
On April 29, Twitter posted another beat with Q1 earnings. Its revenue of $250.5 million beat projections by $9.6 million, and constituted a 116% increase compared to the same period a year before. Still, Twitter stock plunged 10.4% in after-hours trading that day. Shares dropped as low as 14.22% in pre-market trading the following morning. Ad revenue came in at $226 million for a 121% increase versus the prior quarter, and mobile ad revenue was up 5%.
That day, again, Twitter stock plunged more than 10% despite an earnings win. At market open the next day, shares opened down 11.78% – they'd dropped as low as 14.22% in pre-market trading.
On Tuesday, Twitter beat earnings, but instead of share prices plummeting, they were absolutely crushing, up more than 34% after hours.
That's because earnings and revenue haven't mattered in any of Twitter's earnings releases.
What does matter – and what's been lackluster for Twitter so far in 2014 until Tuesday's Q2 – is this number…