Volatility has been an issue on Wall Street for a while, but Tuesday was an extreme example that shows just how confused many investors feel. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI 0.40%) was up nearly 600 points in the early afternoon after having moved more than 200 points lower near the beginning of the session. By the end of the day, though, the Dow joined the S&P 500 (^GSPC 1.02%) and Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC 2.02%) by closing near their lows and extending the downturn that has brought the Nasdaq into bear-market territory.
|
Index |
Daily Percentage Change (Decline) |
Daily Point Change |
|---|---|---|
|
Dow |
(0.56%) |
(185) |
|
S&P 500 |
(0.72%) |
(30) |
|
Nasdaq |
(0.28%) |
(35) |
Data source: Yahoo! Finance.
After the closing bell, a couple of earnings reports came out that drew some attention from investors. Bumble (BMBL -0.57%) has been beaten up badly in the stock market pullback, but the online dating specialist got some support from comments in its latest financial report. Unfortunately, the same wasn't true for Stitch Fix (SFIX 0.47%), which extended its recent declines following its earnings.
Image source: Getty Images.
Bumble gets a boost
Shares of Bumble jumped more than 16% after hours on Tuesday. The online dating service's fourth-quarter numbers pointed to ongoing growth, and Bumble sees 2022 bringing some new opportunities as well.
The company's numbers were solid. Sales rose 26% in the fourth quarter to $208.2 million, with revenue from the Bumble app rising 42% year over year. Total paying users were up 11% to 3 million, and revenue per user climbed by about 14% to $22.83. The service brought in 108,000 new users in just the past three months. Bumble did lose money, but its losses were just a little over half as large as they were in the same period last year.
Moreover, Bumble's outlook for 2022 included some favorable projections. The company anticipates revenue between $934 million and $944 million, which would work out to growth of about 22% to 23% from 2021 levels. That's a substantial slowdown, but it incorporates the assumption that it will lose about $20 million from its recent decision to take its apps off app stores in Russia and Belarus.
Bumble hopes that its recent acquisition of the Gen-Z dating app Fruitz will help bolster its long-term growth trajectory. Even with the gains, Bumble's stock is still down nearly 75% from its highs, though, and it could take a while to get positive momentum back.
Stitch Fix unravels
Meanwhile, Stitch Fix added to its recent declines, falling 16% in after-hours trading. The subscription service for curated apparel delivery wasn't able to meet investors' expectations in its fiscal second-quarter report.
Growth slowed dramatically during the period. Revenue of $517 million was up just 3% from year-ago levels, with active clients rising by 146,000 to 4.02 million. On the plus side, revenue per active client saw some solid gains, hitting $549 and rising 18% year over year. But Stitch Fix continued to produce red ink, with a per-share loss of $0.28 that was larger than many had anticipated.
Stitch Fix had hoped that offering some of its fashions directly through its Freestyle service would help bolster sales, and indeed, revenue from that side of the business jumped 29% from year-ago levels. However, the company said that bringing on clients and converting them to become subscribers has proved challenging, and it's trying to shift toward a less burdensome onboarding process.
Stitch Fix sees its problems continuing, with revenue projections for the third quarter of 2022 calling for a 7% to 10% drop in sales compared to the same period in 2021. Sales for the full fiscal year are now seen as flat to slightly lower, too. That's not the news growth stock investors wanted to hear, and that sent shares to new lows after hours.
