Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) Price Target Raised to $765.00

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META - Get Free Report) had its target price increased by research analysts at Bank of America from $690.00 to $765.00 in a research note issued on Thursday,Benzinga reports. The brokerage currently has a "buy" rating on the social networking company's stock. Bank of America's target price points to a potential upside of 6.62% from the company's current price.

A number of other equities analysts have also weighed in on the company. Needham & Company LLC raised Meta Platforms from an "underperform" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Thursday, July 3rd. KeyCorp increased their price objective on Meta Platforms from $645.00 to $655.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a report on Thursday, May 1st. UBS Group reissued a "buy" rating and issued a $812.00 target price (up from $683.00) on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Thursday, June 26th. Truist Financial upped their target price on Meta Platforms from $700.00 to $720.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, May 1st. Finally, Barclays decreased their target price on Meta Platforms from $705.00 to $640.00 and set an "overweight" rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, May 1st. Five analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating, thirty-seven have assigned a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the company's stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Meta Platforms currently has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and an average price target of $729.38.

Meta Platforms Price Performance

META traded down $9.73 during trading on Thursday, hitting $717.51. The company's stock had a trading volume of 10,855,962 shares, compared to its average volume of 14,460,014. The company has a current ratio of 2.66, a quick ratio of 2.66 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. Meta Platforms has a twelve month low of $442.65 and a twelve month high of $747.90. The business's fifty day simple moving average is $674.77 and its 200 day simple moving average is $634.35. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.80 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 27.98, a P/E/G ratio of 1.76 and a beta of 1.28.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META - Get Free Report) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, April 30th. The social networking company reported $6.43 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $5.33 by $1.10. The firm had revenue of $42.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $41.45 billion. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 38.69% and a net margin of 39.11%. The business's revenue was up 16.1% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $4.71 earnings per share. On average, equities research analysts forecast that Meta Platforms will post 26.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, COO Javier Olivan sold 517 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, July 7th. The shares were sold at an average price of $717.51, for a total value of $370,952.67. Following the sale, the chief operating officer owned 7,336 shares of the company's stock, valued at approximately $5,263,653.36. This represents a 6.58% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 519 shares of the stock in a transaction on Tuesday, July 8th. The shares were sold at an average price of $721.57, for a total transaction of $374,494.83. Following the completion of the sale, the insider directly owned 27,107 shares in the company, valued at approximately $19,559,597.99. This represents a 1.88% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 153,792 shares of company stock worth $105,466,325 in the last three months. 13.61% of the stock is currently owned by corporate insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC grew its holdings in Meta Platforms by 608,429.2% during the 2nd quarter. Kingstone Capital Partners Texas LLC now owns 59,775,823 shares of the social networking company's stock worth $44,119,937,000 after acquiring an additional 59,766,000 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new position in Meta Platforms during the 4th quarter worth about $19,949,512,000. GAMMA Investing LLC grew its holdings in Meta Platforms by 67,172.9% during the 1st quarter. GAMMA Investing LLC now owns 23,452,665 shares of the social networking company's stock worth $13,517,178,000 after acquiring an additional 23,417,803 shares in the last quarter. Nuveen LLC bought a new position in Meta Platforms during the 1st quarter worth about $2,990,544,000. Finally, Raymond James Financial Inc. bought a new position in Meta Platforms during the 4th quarter worth about $2,243,603,000. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

About Meta Platforms

Meta Platforms, Inc engages in the development of products that enable people to connect and share with friends and family through mobile devices, personal computers, virtual reality headsets, and wearables worldwide. It operates in two segments, Family of Apps and Reality Labs. The Family of Apps segment offers Facebook, which enables people to share, discuss, discover, and connect with interests; Instagram, a community for sharing photos, videos, and private messages, as well as feed, stories, reels, video, live, and shops; Messenger, a messaging application for people to connect with friends, family, communities, and businesses across platforms and devices through text, audio, and video calls; and WhatsApp, a messaging application that is used by people and businesses to communicate and transact privately.