NEW YORK, March 13, 2026, 12:46 PM EDT
- Snap slipped roughly 0.9% to $4.61 by midday in New York, giving the company a market cap near $13.0 billion.
- Snap’s facing renewed scrutiny from regulators after Britain rolled out new child-safety measures and Australia released fresh data.
- Snap’s direct revenue now tops a $1 billion annualized run rate, but investors are parsing that alongside a more cautious ad outlook. Subscriptions and other non-ad projects remain under the microscope.
Snap slipped again on Friday, with shares trading near $4.61 at midday in New York—a drop of about 0.9% from Thursday’s close. Fresh scrutiny from regulators in Britain and Australia has turned up the heat on one of the company’s most delicate issues: its young user base. Meta was off 3.1% by the same hour. Pinterest picked up 1.4%, while Reddit edged lower, down 0.3%.
It’s an uncomfortable spot for Snap. Even as the company pushes to reduce its dependence on ads with so-called direct revenue—subscriptions, in-app buys, various user payments—investors are still mulling over a first-quarter revenue forecast that landed just shy of Wall Street’s target, despite a strong holiday stretch.
On Thursday, Britain’s Ofcom and the Information Commissioner’s Office ordered Snap, Meta, TikTok, and YouTube to detail by April 30 how they plan to tighten age checks, make their feeds safer, and halt testing of new features on minors. Ofcom warned it could hit companies with fines reaching 10% of qualifying global revenue. The ICO, for its part, said penalties could climb as high as 4% of worldwide annual turnover.
The squeeze kept coming. According to Qustodio data shared with Reuters on Friday, over 20% of Australian teens under 16 were still active on Snapchat and TikTok two months after the country’s social media ban began, throwing enforcement into the spotlight again. The law threatens platforms with penalties up to A$49.5 million if they let under-16s slip through.
This point is starting to stick, as the old line from companies—that age verification tech is either clunky or too expensive—isn’t holding up like it used to. “The tech definitely has gotten better,” said Merritt Maxim, vice president at Forrester, in comments to Reuters. He noted that advances in identity technology have trimmed verification costs to where companies can use them “without a significant financial impact.” Age-assurance tools are basically software that estimates or confirms a user’s age. Reuters
Snap’s got some figures to lean on. Back in February, the company pointed to its direct-revenue business hitting a $1 billion annualized run rate, and said subscriber numbers climbed past 25 million—a sign of efforts to diversify beyond advertising. Revenue for 2025 came in around $5.93 billion, but Reuters data showed Snap was still in the red, booking a net loss of roughly $460 million.
But advertising continues to lead the conversation. Snap topped Wall Street’s revenue expectations for the fourth quarter back in February, thanks to a bump from holiday ads, but its first-quarter outlook landed just shy of forecasts: $1.50 billion to $1.53 billion, compared with analysts’ $1.55 billion target. “The ads platform (of Snap) still has a long way to go in attracting big budgets from enterprise advertisers,” Emarketer’s Max Willens told Reuters. Reuters
It’s a patchy scene among peers. Last month, Reuters noted Pinterest shares tumbled after it flagged that big retailers were pulling back on ad spending. Reddit, meanwhile, pointed to an uptick, telling investors AI-driven products were luring in advertisers and boosting revenue. In between, there’s Snap—smaller than Meta, still hustling to show its ad platform deserves a bigger slice of budgets.
The risk is straightforward. Stricter child-safety measures could push up costs, and if advertising remains inconsistent, Snap risks continuing to look like a niche platform juggling too much. There is potential in subscriptions, creator features, and other direct revenue streams picking up some slack. Still, with tech stocks sliding on Friday, investors weren’t inclined to give much benefit of the doubt.
