According to reports, staff were informed that more than 500 advertisers paused spending after Elon Musk took over in October.
Twitter’s main source of income is advertising with $5.1bn in revenue in 2021. But advertisers pulled out after concerns of a rise in hate speech on the platform and an increase in impersonator accounts after the platform relaunched its blue tick system.
In another report staff were told in a meeting that Twitter’s revenue for the fourth quarter fell by 35%.
In December Musk said they were facing a negative cashflow situation of $3bn a year but said they should make a cashflow break even after cutting costs including the retrenchment of more than 5,000 employees.
Earlier this month Musk said he will bring back political advertising to Twitter after it took a three-year hiatus.
“We believe that cause-based advertising can facilitate public conversation around important topics. Today, we're relaxing our ads policy for cause-based ads in the US. We also plan to expand the political advertising we permit in the coming weeks,” Twitter Safety wrote.
It’s been a tough year for Twitter since Musk’s $44bn bid to buy the platform was accepted in April. Since the purchase he has been criticised for many decisions such as retrenching staff and creating a paid-for verification system.
Danette Breitenbach 13 hours
