Twitter has lost over $2bn since launch and may never be profitable

Twitter has lost over $2bn (£1.4bn) since the social network was first launched 10 years ago, with $1.6bn of the deficit happening since it went public two years ago.

According to the Form 10-K annual report filed by Twitter, which gives a comprehensive summary of a company's financial performance, Twitter's total accumulated deficit as of 31 December 2015 was $2.09bn, largely due to stock-based compensation awarded to employees.

"We have incurred significant operating losses in the past, and we may not be able to achieve or subsequently maintain profitability," a sub-header in the report reads.

"Although our revenue has grown rapidly, increasing from $28.3 million in 2010 to $2.22 billion in 2015, we expect that our revenue growth rate will slow in the future as a result of a variety of factors, including the decline in the growth rate of our user base.

"We believe that our future revenue growth will depend on, among other factors, our ability to attract new users, increase user engagement and ad engagement, increase our brand awareness, compete effectively, maximise our sales efforts, demonstrate a positive return on investment for advertisers, successfully develop new products and services and expand internationally."

Twitter says its operating costs will only rise

Twitter also emphasised that its costs are likely to increase in the future as it will have to continue to spend a great deal to keep its technology infrastructure up to date, continue R&D on new products, keep and attract talented employees and well as pay out on strategic opportunities such as commercial relationships.

"These investments may not result in increased revenue or growth in our business. If we are unable to generate adequate revenue growth and to manage our expenses, we may continue to incur significant losses in the future and may not be able to achieve or maintain profitability," Twitter writes in the report.

In addition, the social network also points out that because the Twitter business model requires users to have access to the internet, if users suffer from internet outages or they live in a country with a government that chooses to block access to Twitter or charge in order for users to access the service, then this will also cost Twitter in terms of losing both users and advertisers.

The report is essentially a brutally honest and quite depressing look into all the ways Twitter could continue to lose money, with factors such as US and foreign laws, income tax obligations, search engine ranking and even assumptions about key metrics mentioned as potential issues.

Investors, please don't keep your hopes up

If you are currently an investor in Twitter, or were thinking of putting your hard-earned money into the company, the social network makes it clear that more trouble is on the horizon.

"The market price of our common stock has been and will likely continue to be volatile, and you could lose all or part of your investment," a sub-header reads, above an explanation about how common stock prices have ranged from as little as $21.01 up to $74.73.

And even more depressingly, Twitter says that it does not expect to declare any dividends in the foreseeable future: "We do not anticipate declaring any cash dividends to holders of our common stock in the foreseeable future. In addition, our credit facility contains restrictions on payments including payments of cash dividends.

"Consequently, investors may need to rely on sales of our common stock after price appreciation, which may never occur, as the only way to realise any future gains on their investment."