Investing.com - Snap rallied Tuesday, ahead of its first-quarter results due after markets close, as Twitter's better-than-expected results turned investor sentiment positive on social media stocks.
Snap (NYSE:SNAP), parent company of popular photo-sharing app Snapchat, rose 4% as Twitter's better-than-expected monthly active user growth helped sentiment.
In February, Snap said it was "cautiously optimistic," adding that it does "not foresee a sequential decline in daily active users in Q1 2019."
The company said in February daily active users in the fourth quarter of 2018 were flat quarter on quarter at 186 million and down from 187 million a year earlier.
Ahead of Snap's report, analysts, on average, expect daily active users to exceed about 187 million.
Nomura Instinet analyst Mark Kelley is expecting 186 million daily active users. Guggenheim analyst Michael Morris estimated Snap will add 188 million DAUs.
Commentary on Snap's revamped Android app is also expected to feature heavily as the company has been hard at work to bring performance of the Android version up to par with the iOS app.
Ahead of the earnings report, eMarketer suggested the company may report its first ever decline in U.S. monthly users in the first quarter. But Snap was quick to downplay concerns, disputing the methodology eMarketer used in its study.
Snap, which is up about 70% since its fourth-quarter results, is expected to report a quarterly loss of 22 cents per share, according to Investing.com, on revenue of $305.5 million.
Looking ahead to the second quarter, analysts expect Snap to guide for a loss of 9 cents a share on $348 million in revenue.