Jack Dorsey Says No Sale Now For Twitter

Despite rumors about it being a possible acquisition target, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey says he wants the company to remain independent.

“I’ve always thought that there’s a lot of strength to our independence. We can work on every device. We can work through any medium,” Dorsey said at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference, according to Reuters.

Last week, some investment analysts spoke about the possibility of Twitter being acquired after the social media company beat out analyst estimates to deliver its first quarterly profit and an unexpected return to revenue growth.

Revenue rose 2 percent in the fourth quarter from the previous year, due to an expansion outside the United States. The use of data to individualize the targeting of ads – which, in turn, raises click-through rates – was also cited as one of the reasons for the revenue increase. Higher video ad sales and redesigned ad formats also played a factor.

“They are showing the right tweets to the right people at the right time, and as you do that, not only do you drive consumers to use Twitter more, but you attract more and more advertisers to want to be on the platform,” said analyst Richard Greenfield of BTIG Research.

Overall revenue came in at $731.6 million, more than analyst’s target of $686.1 million. The company said it expects to be “GAAP profitable for the full year 2018.”

There have been potential acquisition rumors swirling around Twitter since 2016, with The Walt Disney Co., Verizon, Salesforce and Google all rumored to be potential suitors.

Of course, back then, Twitter shares were trading at about half the current price, so an acquisition right now would be much more expensive.