WASHINGTON: Twitter said Friday profits surged while its user base grew in a quarterly update that lifted its share price.
The short-messaging service said profit rose to $1.1 billion, lifted by a one-time tax benefit, up from $100 million a year earlier.
The profit excluding the one-time adjustment was below forecasts, but revenue was better than expected at $841 million, as was user growth.
Twitter’s new measure of its user base — monetizable daily active users — was 139 million, compared to 122 million in the same period the previous year.
Shares in Twitter rallied 4.9pc in pre-market trades following the release.
The results showed Twitter remains profitable and is boosting the number of users even as it moves aggressively to weed out fake accounts and curb abusive content.
“Health remains our top priority and we are proud of the work we did in Q2,” chief executive Jack Dorsey said in a statement.
“Our focus was on ensuring that our rules, and how we enforce them, are easy to understand. We also continued our work to proactively identify and address malicious behaviour, resulting in an 18pc drop in reports of spammy or suspicious behaviour.
