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Gay dating app Grindr's stock soars after going public

NPR | By Giulia Heyward
Published November 19, 2022 at 6:01 AM EST
Grindr puts on a public show outside of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) as the company goes public following its merger with special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) Tiga Acquisition Corp. on November 18, 2022 in New York City.
Spencer Platt
/
Getty Images
Grindr puts on a public show outside of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) as the company goes public following its merger with special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) Tiga Acquisition Corp. on November 18, 2022 in New York City.

Grindr came out swinging when it made its debut on the New York Stock Exchange. The gay dating app's stock rose by more than 400% after going public on Friday.

The self-described "leading platform focused on the LGBTQ+ community" announced its intention to become a public company back in March. In September, the app's board of directors appointed both a chief executive, and a chief financial officer. On Friday, the dating app announced its successful merger with Tiga Acquisition Corp, a special purpose acquisition company. Grindr Inc. debuted on the New York Stock Exchange that same day under the symbols "GRND" and "GRND.WS."

"Today marks an important milestone not only for the team at Grindr, but for the LGBTQ community we serve," Grindr's chief executive officer, George Arison, said. "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."

And the dating app's stock is definitely one to watch: It debuted at $16.90 at 9:30 a.m. and hit a high of $71.51 before midday, according to MarketWatch. The stock closed at $36.50, a 214% increase compared to Thursday, the last trading session before the merger.

Grindr, which launched in 2009, reported roughly 11 million daily users per day last year. Users sent a combined 260 million messages in that same period, and spent an average of 61 minutes per day on the app. In the same announcement, Grindr estimated the value of its "highly engaged user base in a large and untapped addressable market" at $4 billion.

Copyright 2022 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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Giulia Heyward
Giulia Heyward is a weekend reporter for Digital News, based out of New York. She previously covered education and other national news as a reporting fellow at The New York Times and as the national education reporter at Capital B News. She interned for POLITICO, where she covered criminal justice reform in Florida, and CNN, as a writer for the trends & culture team. Her work has also been published in The Atlantic, HuffPost and The New Republic.
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