Twitter says Trump's tweets are good for its business, but the numbers don't back that up (TWTR)
President Donald Trump's heavy use of Twitter is good for business, executives from the social network said on Thursday.
"The president's use of Twitter has broadened the awareness of how the platform can be used," Twitter CFO Anthony Noto said during the company's fourth-quarter earnings call with investors. "It shows the power of Twitter."
Noto also noted, however, that "it's very hard for a single person to drive sustained growth," a nod to the fact that Twitter's monthly user base grew by a mere 2 million during the fourth quarter. Facebook, by comparison, added 72 million users during the same amount of time. Twitter also missed Wall Street's growth expectations in its latest earnings release, and its stock was driven down by nearly 10% when the market opened on Thursday.
Twitter has received sharp criticism for the pulpit it gives Trump. The company has been prompted to say it would bar the president if he were to violate its rules on hate speech and abuse. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey publicly came out against Trump's recent immigration ban, and Twitter employees collectively donated $1.6 million to the American Civil Liberties Union.
The company's top brass may disagree with Trump's policies, but watchers of Twitter have expected Trump's use of the platform to drive engagement at a time when overall growth has slowed.
"The incessant news flow from the Trump administration playing out on Twitter and the ensuing global reaction pushes Twitter users to be increasingly engaged with the platform," BTIG analyst Richard Greenfield said in a note to clients on Wednesday.
While Trump certainly hasn't saved Twitter's core ad business, his constant stream of tweets highlights what Dorsey called Twitter's "superpower" on Thursday.
"The superpower we really provide the world is we can break news and get information faster to people than any other service in the world," he said.
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