Spotify (SPOT) shares fell as much as 8% in early premarket trading Tuesday after the company reported disappointing user and financial guidance. The stock later pared some losses, down about 6% roughly an hour before the market opened.
The company guided to second quarter monthly active users (MAUs) of 689 million, below the roughly 694 million that analysts polled by Bloomberg had expected. Q2 guidance for operating income and gross margins also fell short of expectations.
For the first quarter, MAUs rose 10% year over year to 678 million, a slight miss compared to the 679 million estimate. Premium subscribers rose 12% over the prior year to 268 million, the second-highest Q1 subscriber net addition in the company’s history.
“The underlying data at the moment is very healthy: engagement remains high, retention is strong, and thanks to our freemium model, people have the flexibility to stay with us even when things feel more uncertain,” Spotify CEO Daniel Ek said in the earnings release.
“So yes, the short term may bring some noise, but we remain confident in the long-term story, and the direction we’re heading in feels clearer than ever.”
At close: April 28 at 4:00:02 PM EDT
Heading into the results, Wall Street analysts have said the music platform acts as a defensive play amid ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty weighing on Big Tech, similar to fellow streaming giant Netflix.
“It is our view that SPOT’s subscription model should be more defensive/utility-like amid the current macro uncertainty,” Bank of America analyst Jessica Reif Ehrlich wrote ahead of the results.
Spotify stock surged to all-time highs of around $652 in mid-February. Although the stock is off those records, it’s still climbed roughly 106% over the past year as of Monday’s close, a stark comeback from the record lows it faced in 2022.
In February, the company reported its first full year of profitability and also set quarterly record highs for revenue, gross margin, operating income, and free cash flow.
Read more about Spotify’s stock moves and today’s market action.
The company’s colossal run-up in shares follows an intense business overhaul, which has included everything from mass layoffs and C-suite shakeups to a shift away from podcast exclusivity, an area it had aggressively pursued.
Spotify has drastically scaled back its podcast investments after spending $1 billion to push into the market between 2019 and 2021. It has since cut costs and narrowed its content focus, though it remains committed to the medium.
On Monday, Spotify said it paid more than $100 million to podcast publishers and podcasters worldwide in the first quarter, reflecting what it called “our deep commitment to the creator economy.” That figure includes payments to creators across all formats and agreements, including marquee names like Joe Rogan and Alex Cooper.
