Pinterest plunges as tariffs weigh on large customers’ ad spending

Feb 13 (Reuters) – Pinterest shares plummeted over 20% in premarket trading on Friday after the image-sharing platform said its quarterly ‌revenue forecast was hit by large U.S. retailers scaling back ad ‌spending due to tariff-induced uncertainty.

The company last month cut under 15% of its workforce, ​a restructuring that CFO Julia Donnelly said could disrupt near-term performance, as Pinterest rebuilds its go‑to‑market teams. The warning added to pressure on a business already squeezed by softer retail advertising.

Meta in January highlighted strong momentum in ‌e‑commerce advertising, while TikTok ⁠survived in the U.S. after facing legal and political pressure. OpenAI, meanwhile, has entered the fray with ad slots ⁠on ChatGPT in the U.S., widening the field of players vying for the same marketing budgets.

Pinterest’s stock is on track to open at its ​lowest since ​April 2020.

Google has stepped up its ​commerce push with shopping-focused updates ‌to its Gemini chatbot and AI search, tightening Big Tech’s grip on digital ads as smaller players such as Pinterest face a tougher backdrop.

“We’ll probably see AI-powered Pinterest clones from Meta, OpenAI, and Amazon soon,” Bernstein analysts said in a note.

At least 16 brokerages cut their price targets ‌on Pinterest’s stock, which was set ​to lose more than $2 billion from its ​market value of $12.52 billion if ​the premarket losses hold.

The company trades at 9.49 times ‌the estimates of its earnings for ​the next 12 ​months, compared with 9.42 for Snap, 29.99 for Reddit and 21.41 for Meta.

Last year, Pinterest said it would buy adtech firm tvScientific, ​as the social media ‌company expands into TV ad inventory for its core consumer ​goods and retail advertisers.

(Reporting by Kritika Lamba and Jaspreet Singh ​in Bengaluru; Editing by Maju Samuel)