A WORLD IN ISOLATION, A SURGE OF NEW USERS FOR TWITTER

The global pandemic and U.S. protests are forcing a pullback by advertisers on Twitter, but it’s also led to an unprecedented surge of users.

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Average daily user growth spiked 34% in the second quarter, the company said Thursday, the largest jump in users ever recorded by the company.

In an earnings call, CEO Jack Dorsey addressed an embarrassing hacking incident last week that compromised the accounts of high profile users, saying he felt “terrible” about it.

Shares of Twitter bounced 6% higher.

But the company took a huge tax hit to earnings, posting a net loss of $1.2 billion, or $1.56 per share, in the April-June period, compared with profit of $1.1 billion, or $1.43 per share, a year earlier.

Revenue fell by about a fifth to $683 million, far short of the $702 million Wall Street had expected, according to a survey of analysts by FactSet.