How Facebook Is Blowing Snapchat Out of the Water

June 20, 2017 by Chris Lange

Snap Inc. (NYSE: SNAP) shares took another step closer to an all-time low on Tuesday after Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB) reported that its photo-sharing app, Instagram Stories, now has 250 million daily active users (DAU). With this announcement Facebook blew Snap out of the water.

Instagram Stories originally passed Snapchat in April when it announced 200 million DAUs. According to Snap’s last earnings report in May, the Snapchat platform totaled 166 million DAUs.

When asked about copying Snapchat and its platform, Carolyn Everson, Facebook’s global head of sales, was dismissive to say the least. Instead she pivoted saying that Facebook invented the Feed format that other competitors use.

In an interview with CNBC, Everson commented:

If you think about it a year ago when we sat together, Instagram Stories didn’t exist. Today on the platform, we not only have 250 million people using it, but actually a third (of the most viewed stories) are businesses using Instagram Stories and one million are advertisers.

She added:

Our user growth for stories is actually coming at the explosive growth for Instagram overall. Instagram is now at 700 million people globally.

Shares of Snap were last seen down about 2% at $17.49 on Tuesday, with a consensus analyst price target of $20.90 and a post-IPO range of $17.00 to $29.44.

Facebook traded at $152.73. The stock has a 52-week range of $108.23 to $155.59 and a consensus price target of $169.30.

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