Adam Bain's Departure Highlights Twitter's Uncertain Future

Twitter Inc TWTR announced on November 9 that its chief operating officer, Adam Bain, had decided to step down from his position. His role would be assumed by the current chief financial officer, Anthony Noto.

Wedbush’s Michael Pachter maintains a Neutral rating on the company, with a price target of $14.

Bain’s Departure

“There was no specific reason cited for Mr. Bain’s decision to leave Twitter, and Mr. Noto will continue to act as CFO until a new CFO is appointed,” Pachter mentioned.

The departure of Bain could be “a blow for struggling Twitter,” said Reuters, while stating the company had announced in October it intended to cut its global workforce by 9 percent to control costs.

Adam Bain’s departure “leaves a gap in operational expertise and underscores an indefinite path forward for the company,” the analyst concurred.

Challenged Company

Pachter went on to point out that Twitter was a “challenged company with stalled user growth,” and Noto might be able to keep the company on its current course, although whether his taking on the role of COO could help change the course was uncertain.

The analyst believes Twitter requires significant change in its user interface and needs to convince non-users of the value of its service, while also attracting a significantly greater number of advertisers.

At the same time, this is also the platform people go to for real-time information, as seen on election night, when Twitter broke its previous record for single-day tweets set on Election Day 2012.

For now, while “management is now clearly focused on profitability, user experience and costs remain the limiting factors,” the analyst added.

In Thursday's pre-market, Twitter was seen down 0.73 percent at $18.99.