Pinterest plunges as gloomy forecast dampens revenue rebound hopes

(Reuters) – Pinterest shares tumbled more than 12% premarket on Wednesday after a muted third-quarter outlook dashed Wall Street’s expectations for a stabilization in its revenues amid a rebound in the digital ad market.

The photo-sharing platform on Tuesday projected current-quarter revenue below analysts’ estimates, as it struggles to keep up with the competition from bigger rivals including Meta’s Instagram and Facebook and Alphabet.

The digital advertising market is bouncing back from a slump seen in 2022 and early 2023, but pockets of weakness remain and are eating into business at Pinterest.

San Francisco, California-based Pinterest flagged material weakness in demand from advertisers in the consumer goods space, particularly food and beverage companies, which offset strength in ad spend in the technology and financial services sectors.

“The optics of a lighter (third quarter) guide will not help recently growing ad fears, and some will be concerned that food & beverage pressure — which has been isolated — could spread to other verticals with a potentially softer consumer,” J.P. Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth said in a note.

Pinterest’s outlook could also spell trouble for other smaller ad players such as SnapChat owner Snap and ad tech firm Trade Desk, analysts said, noting 18% of the gross spend at Trade Desk last year came from food and beverage firms.

Shares of Snap dipped more than 2% premarket on Wednesday, with Trade Desk down 1.5%. Pinterest is set to lose about $2.8 billion in market value, if losses hold.

Pinterest could take yet another hit from the lack of political ads on its platform, unlike Meta and Alphabet which are set to benefit from political advertising in the run-up to the U.S. elections.

“Pinterest… gets no benefit from momentum others will get starting end of August/early September,” RBC analysts said, noting that could be a “few hundred” basis points of a headwind for Pinterest.

At least 11 brokerages cut their price targets on Pinterest.

(Reporting by Deborah Sophia in Bengaluru; Editing by Vijay Kishore)