Pinterest Logs First Full-Year Profit, Despite User Decline

Pinterest saw its stock surge after an unexpectedly strong fourth-quarter earnings report on Thursday.

The company reported its first full-year profit and more than $2 billion in annual revenue — up 52% from 2020.

Fourth-quarter revenue rose 20% year-over-year, to $846.7 million, and net income was $174.7 million, or 25 cents a share—up from $207.8 million, or 43 cents a share, in Q4 2020. The results beat analysts’ estimates.

But Pinterest’s global monthly active users (MAUs) declined 6% year-over-year in the quarter, to 431 million, including a 12% decline in U.S users, to 86 million, and a 4% dip in international users, to 346 million. Analysts had projected 446 million MAUs for the period.

Pinterest blamed the decrease on lower search traffic.

CEO Ben Silbermann said the company will double down on its investments in scaling the distribution of its Idea Pins through its creator-led content efforts and enhance its “core Pinner experience” and shopping.

Idea Pins (shown above) — a video-first feature designed to make it easy for creators to publish “high-quality, long-lasting, save-able content” directly to Pinterest — have seen strong uptake since being introduced globally in May 2021, and were credited with helping to drive Pinterest’s revenue growth for the year.

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