Snap finally gains some momentum with its newest feature (SNAP)

pulse

August 16, 2017 4:54 PM

Snap's stock price has been hit by pressures from its ongoing period of stock lockup, but with those wrapping up, investors are now able to focus on parts of the company.

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Snap released its newest feature, dubbed "Crowd Surf", and it might be a sign of a brighter future for the social media company.

Snap is up 1.65% to around $13.01 on Wednesday after the company released the new video story feature.

Crowd Surf allows users to jump around videos from an event in real time. Snap analyzes the audio from the many videos taken at a large event like a concert of a speech and plays through the audio linearly as the camera angle changes to different view points. Snap debuted the feature at a recent Lorde concert.

The narrative surrounding the company over the last month has been focused on lockup expirations. Lockup periods were built into the company's initial public offering in order to restrict company insiders from selling their shares right as the company went public.

1.2 billion shares have become available for trading for the first time this month as those lockups have expired, but most of the lockup periods have now passed, allowing investors to focus on other things.

Crowd Surf is the first feature released by Snap out of the shadow of the lockup period. The company's stock price saw small boosts from its release of a streamlined ad buying platform and its "Snap Maps" feature over the last several weeks, but the boosts were short lived as the company continued to face lockup pressures.

Now above $13, the company is 15.25% higher than its all-time intraday low of $11.28 hit in the midst of the lockup worry. Barclays previously said the perfect time to buy would come after the lockup worries subsided, and Cantor Fitzgerald said the worst times "should now be behind the company."

Snap is still down 23.53% since it went public at a share price of $17.

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