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Twitter ( TWTR ) reported late Wednesday that user growth slowed for the fourth consecutive quarter in Q4 as it guided Q1 revenue below consensus estimates, raising concerns that usage may be peaking. The average monthly active user base rose 9% year over year in Q4 to 320 million. Wall Street had expected Twitter to report a 12% rise in users to 323 million. Growth has cooled from 18% in Q1, to 15% in Q2 and 11% in Q3. Excluding “SMS Fast Followers,” monthly active users rose 6% annually to 305 million but fell from 307 million in Q3. Adjusted earnings rose 33% to 16 cents a share. Analysts polled by Thomson Reuters had expected 12 cents. Revenue jumped 48% to $710.5 million, above the $709.9 million consensus expectation. Twitter sees Q1 revenue of $595 million-$610 million, below Wall Street views of $627.1 million. Shares declined 3% in late trading, after rising 4% in the regular session. User growth concerns have depressed Twitter stock, which sunk to an all-time low of 14.31 on Tuesday. Twitter’s report followed LinkedIn’s ( LNKD ) stock crash last Thursday after the professional networking firm gave guidance far below the Wall Street consensus estimate, while also reporting Q4 earnings that beat. The continued slowdown in Twitter usage came despite a series of new features it rolled out last year, including video tool Periscope and Moments. Earlier Wednesday, the social media network said it is testing a new feature that would make the microblog look a bit more like its No. 1 rival, social networking king Facebook ( FB ). ‘Few – If Any – Bright Spots’ Chilton Capital Management economist Samuel Rines told IBD via email that “the user metrics — the key to sustainable future growth — collapsed,” noting that active users fell in the U.S. and were flat internationally. “The decline in users was the truly disappointing part of the release,” he said. “And it is even more disheartening given that there is an election cycle, and (Republican presidential candidate) Donald Trump’s tweets should have been at least somewhat of a draw to the platform. There were few — if any — bright spots in the release.” Rines also directly attributed Twitter’s soft Q1 revenue guidance to its weak user growth. “It now becomes a conversation around whether we have seen peak Twitter usage,” he said. “And management will have a difficult—if not impossible job of proving otherwise without a sudden reacceleration in user growth. It’s tough to see how product usage accelerates—at least with the current product and rate of innovation.” On a call with analysts after the release, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said the company “saw some really promising growth with the test of the timeline (changes). We think there’s a lot of opportunity in our product to fix some broken windows and confusing aspects of our service that we know are inhibiting growth.” But user retention rates were positive in Q4, said Twitter CFO Anthony Noto on the call. “The retention rate of those users that we either resurrected or that we acquired new was strong. In fact, new monthly active users acquired through marketing efforts were performing better from a retention rate standpoint vs. new organic MAUs we acquired.” Limited Potential? “So, we will continue to integrate marketing into our strategy,” Noto added. “We are going to simplify the product, but we also have to clearly communicate its value. Marketing will play that role.” In an industry report on Wednesday before the release, Cowen and Co. analyst John Blackledge handed Twitter stock a price cut, to 17 from 26. Blackledge also he lowered revenue estimates for Twitter for 2016 through 2021. Advertising, which makes up 90% of Twitter’s total revenues, will “see continued deceleration over time,” RBC Capital Markets analyst Mark Mahaney wrote in a report last week. “Our concern for some time has been that Twitter’s lack of real-time commercial intent (a la Alphabet ( GOOGL )-owned Google) or detailed, authentic profiles (a la Facebook) will eventually limit Twitter’s growth potential.”