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Twitter surprises Wall Street with better-than-expected earnings, revenue, user growth

Q2 marks the last quarter under the helm of former CEO Dick Costolo, who ​announced he was stepping down from Twitter's executive perch in June.
Written by Rachel King, Contributor

Twitter published much better-than-expected second quarter financial results after the bell on Tuesday.

The social network posted a net loss of $137 million, or 21 cents per share (statement).

Non-GAAP earnings were seven cents per share on a revenue of $502 million, up 61 percent year-over-year.

Wall Street was looking for earnings of four cents per share with $481.28 million in revenue.

But with Twitter, most eyeballs are usually scanning and honing in on another figure: user growth.

Estimates were a bit wild (albeit low), with projections falling everywhere between two million and eight million new users during the quarter.

Twitter ended Q2 with approximately 316 million monthly active users worldwide, up 15 percent year-over-year. That's up eight million from 308 million at the end of Q1.

Nevertheless, interim CEO Jack Dorsey said the San Francisco-based company is "not satisfied with our growth in audience."

"In order to realize Twitter's full potential, we must improve in three key areas: ensure more disciplined execution, simplify our service to deliver Twitter's value faster, and better communicate that value," Dorsey explained.

Dorsey did seem pleased about Twitter's monetization efforts, which were largely fueled by mobile advertising. That vertical accounted for 88 percent of all advertising revenue, which totaled $452 million in Q2, up 63 percent year-over-year.

Q2 marks the last quarter under the helm of former CEO Dick Costolo, who announced he was stepping down from Twitter's executive perch in June.

In early July, he was replaced by Dorsey, Twitter's co-founder and former CEO -- not to mention Square's current CEO -- during the interim period while the search continues.

Costolo will stay on with Twitter as a member of the board.

Twitter already has a busy schedule ahead of itself, including its second annual summit for mobile app developers, Flight, in San Francisco this October.

For the current quarter, Wall Street is looking for non-GAAP earnings of six cents per share with $555.78 million in revenue.

Twitter responded with a Q3 revenue guidance range of $545 million to $560 million. For the full year, Twitter is expecting revenue to fall within the range of $2.20 billion to $2.27 billion.

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