Groupon’s first financial results since it went public sent investors scrambling to ditch their shares in the daily-deal company, which reported a fourth-quarter loss of $9.8 million. The company attributed the loss to high tax rates for its overseas operations and misguided marketing strategies. However, it surpassed analysts’ expectations in its revenue for the quarter, which jumped 194 percent from a year earlier. Groupon also claims to have 20 percent more users now—33 million worldwide—than it did a year ago. “This quarter’s results show that our model is just starting to demonstrate leverage—and that Groupon is the clear leader in our space,” despite competition with Google+, the company’s CFO told The New York Times.
