Grindr’s Stock Soars at Launch Despite Tech Stock Downturn

Dating app Grindr launched its initial public offering in mid-November and saw its stock quickly soar thanks to enthusiastic investors, and despite the recent downturn of tech and dating app markets. The stock rose more than 400 percent after it launched.

According to MarketWatch, the stock debuted at $16.90 on Friday November 18th, and hit a high of $71.51 before noon. It then closed out the day at $36.50. The LGBTQ+ dating app merged with Tiga Acquisition Corp, a special purpose acquisition company, and debuted that day on the NYSE under the symbols GRND and GRND.WS. Unfortunately, a week and a half later and now the stock has trading as low as $7.63.

"Today marks an important milestone not only for the team at Grindr, but for the LGBTQ community we serve," said Grindr's chief executive officer, George Arison, in a statement reported by NPR. "We enter the public markets with momentum, carried by our market leadership, strong financial performance and significant growth runway as we step up investment in our core product and services."

It's an interesting turn in the dating app market, when third quarter earnings reports led Bumble to lower its expected revenue projections through the end of the year because younger singles are opting not to renew subscriptions. The company pointed to a rise in inflation and the war in Ukraine as contributing factors.

Match Group had better-then-expected third quarter earnings, but the company warned that revenue projections for its star app Tinder would be less than expected for fourth quarter, as singles were not making as many in-app purchases for popular features like Super Like. Match Group also pointed to inflation as a problem, and that consumers were not spending as much on the app.

Grindr however has been optimistic, launching new features and beefing up its safety protocols, including providing 24-hour content moderation for accounts that have been blocked and reported. The company also added video features to cut down on bots and fake accounts, which proliferate on dating apps.

Grindr launched in 2009, and has reported (via a press release) almost 11 million daily users as of 2021, according to NPR. Users sent a combined total of 260 million messages in 2021, and spent an average of 61 minutes per day on the app.

In its announcement and stock debut, Grindr pointed to its "highly engaged user base in a large and untapped addressable market," according to NPR, which they estimated at $4 billion.

There are other gay dating apps with growing user bases besides Grindr, including Scruff, Jack’d and Chinese-based app Blued, as well as new dating app Motto, which was launched by Grindr’s founder to help “course-correct” the racial discrimination found on gay dating apps.