Snapchat, battling negative reviews for its latest update, was dealt a huge blow on Thursday after reality-star-model-cosmetic-maker Kylie Jenner questioned the usefulness of the messaging app. The company lost $1.3 billion in market capital after she said that she has stopped using the app.
Jenner had tweeted;
“Sooo does anyone else not open Snapchat anymore? Or is it just me… ugh this is so sad,” she told her 24.5 million followers yesterday. Her tweet came as Citigroup downgraded the stock of Snapchat operator Snap Inc to “sell”. — Kylie Jenner (@KylieJenner) February 21, 2018
The tweet was retweeted over 50,000 times and liked by over 290,000 users.
She, however, tried to make amends by saying that she still loved the app but the damage had already been done.
Tweeting;
“Still love you tho snap … my first love,” she said in a tweet, 11 minutes after the earlier post.
Following her tweet, Snap stocks dropped almost 8%. They, however, closed 6% down on Wall Street. They are now back near the $17 price at which the shares were listed when the company floated on the stock market.
Shares of Snap rose in February above its IPO price of $17 for the first time since July.
Jenner’s criticism came at a time when investors are worried over negative user reviews.
A Change.org petition that sought a reversal of the messaging app’s latest redesign has over a million signatures and the company was forced to respond to the petition.
In its response, Snapchat did not agree to the petitioners’ demand but promised to roll out a new update in the coming weeks that will bring some changes to the ‘Friends and Discover’ section in the app.
Last week, Chief Executive Evan Spiegel told an investor conference in San Francisco that he was pleased with the redesign and thought it was a more logical setup for users.
The petition titled ‘Remove the new Snapchat Update’, which has been signed by over 1.2 million people so far, said the new update made many features difficult to use.
The petition said it aimed to convince Snap Inc to change the app back to the version prior to the 2018 update.
Meanwhile, Snap Inc said that its Chief Executive Evan Spiegel received $637.8 million as total compensation last year after the company went public.
Spiegel’s pay package is based on stock-based awards worth $636.6 million and salary and other compensation worth about $1.2 million, according to a security filing by Snap on Thursday.
“I believe this is the largest value we have seen in the 10 years we’ve been compiling annual ‘highest-paid’ CEO studies,” said Dan Marcec, Director of Content at executive compensation data firm Equilar.
Jenner has huge followings on various social media platforms including Twitter and Instagram. She gave birth to a daughter this month and her instagram post announcing the pregnancy quickly became one of the most liked posts of all time on the social media platform
