Instagram is now estimated to be worth $100 billion according to a report released by Bloomberg Intelligence. That valuation would mark a 100-fold increase from the $1 billion social media giant Facebook paid for the app in 2012.
The photo-sharing platform reached 1 billion monthly active users this month, a number that will likely put Instagram’s revenues past $10 billion within the next year, according to Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Jitendra Waral, who released the report on Monday.
Instagram is growing at a rate faster than Facebook in terms of new users – it’s expected to have more than 2 billion users within the next five years, Waral said. While the parent company has already reached that landmark, Instagram, with its younger audience, is more attractive to advertisers. Unlike Facebook, Instagram is also still growing in the U.S.
Waral says Instagram’s revenues could account for as much as 16% of Facebook’s over the coming year. That would be up from about 11% last year. Instagram announced IGTV, the platform’s television unit last week, but Waral says most of Instagram’s 2018 revenue will likely come from newsfeed ads.
Photo by Anthony Quintano via Flickr