Core Viewpoint - Reddit (RDDT) shares have declined 26.5% year-to-date, underperforming the broader Zacks Computer & Technology sector's decline of 11% and the Zacks Internet - Software industry's rise of 5.8% [1] Group 1: Performance and Market Conditions - The underperformance of RDDT is attributed to a worsening macroeconomic environment following U.S. tariffs on trading partners, including China and Mexico, and intense competition from other social media platforms affecting user engagement and market share in advertising [2] - Reddit experienced volatility due to a periodic algorithm change by Google Search in Q4 2024, which affected traffic primarily for logged-out users [3] Group 2: Revenue and Growth Drivers - RDDT is benefiting from strong user growth, improved advertising performance across multiple channels, and significant investments in AI-driven tools and machine translation, with advertising accounting for 91.2% of Reddit's 2024 revenues totaling $1.3 billion [7] - The company's focus on diversifying its advertising solutions and enhancing ad efficiency has emerged as a critical growth driver [8] Group 3: Product Development and User Engagement - Reddit's expanding advertising product portfolio includes AI-powered tools like the Headline Generator and Reddit Pro Trends, which help businesses gain real-time insights and grow organically on the platform [9] - In March 2025, Reddit introduced tools to enhance user engagement, including a post-check to prevent rule violations and a post-recovery feature for retrieving removed content [10] Group 4: Partnerships and New Initiatives - Reddit's partnership with Alphabet (GOOGL) enhances content discovery and community engagement by providing access to Reddit's Data API, benefiting both companies [11] - In December 2024, Reddit announced testing of "Reddit Answers," an AI-powered chatbot that provides curated summaries and community recommendations [12] - In February 2025, Reddit partnered with Intercontinental Exchange to create data and analytics products for the financial industry, leveraging its extensive user-generated content [14] Group 5: Earnings Estimates and Competition - For Q1 2025, RDDT expects revenues between $360 million and $370 million, with a Zacks Consensus Estimate of $327.70 million, indicating year-over-year growth of 53.40% [15] - Despite RDDT's expanding advertising business, it faces stiff competition from Snap (SNAP), which is enhancing its advertising offerings with new formats like Sponsored AI Lenses and tools like Snap Pixel [16][17]