Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC Boosts Position in Meta Platforms, Inc. $META

Key Points

• Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC raised its stake in Meta Platforms by 6.3% in Q4 to 88,424 shares (≈$58.37M), representing 3.3% of the fund’s portfolio and its eighth‑largest holding.
• Company momentum around AI strengthened with a multi‑year chip partnership with Broadcom and roughly $21 billion of new cloud commitments (CoreWeave), signaling durable demand for Meta’s AI compute and infrastructure plans.
• Analysts are broadly positive (consensus "Moderate Buy" with a target of $837.72), but near‑term risks include EU regulatory actions over WhatsApp AI access, higher Quest VR prices, and notable insider share sales.

Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC boosted its position in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META - Free Report) by 6.3% during the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The fund owned 88,424 shares of the social networking company's stock after acquiring an additional 5,253 shares during the period. Meta Platforms accounts for 3.3% of Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC's portfolio, making the stock its 8th largest position. Franklin Street Advisors Inc. NC's holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $58,368,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds have also added to or reduced their stakes in META. Brighton Jones LLC boosted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 1.7% in the fourth quarter. Brighton Jones LLC now owns 34,551 shares of the social networking company's stock valued at $20,230,000 after acquiring an additional 570 shares during the last quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC boosted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 10.2% in the fourth quarter. Revolve Wealth Partners LLC now owns 9,456 shares of the social networking company's stock valued at $5,537,000 after acquiring an additional 875 shares during the last quarter. Headwater Capital Co Ltd boosted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 294.7% in the first quarter. Headwater Capital Co Ltd now owns 150,000 shares of the social networking company's stock valued at $86,454,000 after acquiring an additional 112,000 shares during the last quarter. Dymon Asia Capital Singapore PTE. LTD. bought a new position in Meta Platforms in the second quarter valued at about $213,000. Finally, Capital & Planning LLC bought a new position in Meta Platforms in the second quarter valued at about $322,000. Institutional investors own 79.91% of the company's stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

META has been the topic of several recent research reports. Guggenheim raised their price target on Meta Platforms from $800.00 to $850.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Piper Sandler raised their price target on Meta Platforms from $840.00 to $880.00 and gave the stock an "overweight" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Wells Fargo & Company reduced their price target on Meta Platforms from $856.00 to $765.00 and set an "overweight" rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, April 2nd. Pivotal Research reduced their price target on Meta Platforms from $930.00 to $910.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Finally, Arete Research restated a "neutral" rating on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Thursday, March 5th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-eight have given a Buy rating and eight have given a Hold rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $837.72.

Key Meta Platforms News

Here are the key news stories impacting Meta Platforms this week:

• Positive Sentiment: Expanded multi‑year AI chip partnership with Broadcom supports Meta’s plan to scale in‑house AI accelerators and networking capacity through 2029, reducing supply risk and boosting long‑term margin/compute control. Meta, Broadcom strike multi-year AI chip deal
• Positive Sentiment: CoreWeave confirmed Meta added roughly $21 billion of new commitments through 2032, signaling large, durable demand for AI cloud capacity tied to Meta’s training/inference needs. CoreWeave's April Shockwave — Meta, Anthropic, Jane Street All Say Yes
• Positive Sentiment: Bullish analyst coverage: TD Cowen reaffirmed a Buy and set an $820 target, and Morgan Stanley named META a top Big Tech pick — both lift sentiment and buying interest. TD Cowen reiterates buy; $820 target
• Neutral Sentiment: Meta’s aggressive AI capex plans (massive 2026 investments) reinforce the company’s long‑term AI thesis but also imply near‑term heavy spending that could pressure free cash flow. Is Meta Platforms a Hot Internet Content and Information Stock as It Invests Heavily in AI?
• Neutral Sentiment: Macro: weekly jobless claims came in below expectations, a positive economic signal that can support ad demand and broad market risk appetite. Weekly Jobless Claims Below Expectations
• Neutral Sentiment: Internal changes at Reality Labs aim to speed hardware development — potentially positive for metaverse ambitions but execution risk remains. Meta Makes Major Changes to Speed Reality Labs' Progress
• Negative Sentiment: EU regulators moved to force Meta to restore full WhatsApp access for rival AI assistants and ordered rollback of the access fee — a material regulatory risk that could limit monetization options and invite fines. EU warns Meta WhatsApp AI fee breaches antitrust rules, orders rollback
• Negative Sentiment: Meta will raise Quest VR headset prices in the U.S. starting April 19 due to higher memory chip costs — could damp demand for hardware and signal margin pressure in consumer devices. Meta to raise Quest VR headset prices in US on rising component costs
• Negative Sentiment: COO Javier Olivan executed planned Rule 10b5‑1 sales, reducing his stake meaningfully; although on a trading plan, such sales can be perceived negatively by some investors. SEC filing: Javier Olivan insider sales

Meta Platforms Trading Up 0.8%

Shares of NASDAQ META opened at $676.87 on Friday. The company's fifty day moving average is $626.94 and its 200-day moving average is $652.21. The stock has a market cap of $1.71 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 28.80, a P/E/G ratio of 1.04 and a beta of 1.31. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a twelve month low of $479.80 and a twelve month high of $796.25. The company has a quick ratio of 2.60, a current ratio of 2.60 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META - Get Free Report) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 28th. The social networking company reported $8.88 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts' consensus estimates of $8.16 by $0.72. Meta Platforms had a net margin of 30.08% and a return on equity of 38.61%. The firm had revenue of $59.89 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $58.33 billion. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $8.02 earnings per share. The business's revenue was up 23.8% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts predict that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.7 EPS for the current year.

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, March 26th. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 16th were paid a $0.525 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, March 16th. This represents a $2.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.3%. Meta Platforms's payout ratio is presently 8.94%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Meta Platforms

In other Meta Platforms news, CTO Andrew Bosworth sold 8,089 shares of Meta Platforms stock in a transaction that occurred on Wednesday, February 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $631.24, for a total value of $5,106,100.36. Following the transaction, the chief technology officer owned 2,841 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $1,793,352.84. The trade was a 74.01% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available through the SEC website. Also, CFO Susan J. Li sold 56,571 shares of Meta Platforms stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $644.70, for a total transaction of $36,471,323.70. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 164,499 shares of company stock valued at $105,237,895. 13.61% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

About Meta Platforms

Meta Platforms, Inc NASDAQ: META, formerly Facebook, Inc, is a global technology company best known for building social networking services and immersive computing platforms. Founded in 2004 and headquartered in Menlo Park, California, the company operates a family of consumer-facing products and services that connect users, creators and businesses. In October 2021 the company rebranded as Meta to reflect an expanded strategic focus on augmented and virtual reality technologies alongside its social media businesses.

Meta's core consumer products include Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, which enable social networking, messaging, content sharing and community building across mobile and desktop devices.

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