Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) Stock Price Up 2.6% - Should You Buy?

Key Points

• Meta's stock climbed 2.6% midday, trading as high as $637.50 with volume about 17% above the daily average, signaling investor interest after fresh company developments.
• Key catalysts include the launch of AI model Muse Spark, a roughly $21 billion expanded cloud compute deal with CoreWeave and a PayPal commerce tie‑up, which have driven analyst price‑target upgrades and a consensus "Moderate Buy" target near $839.
• Risks remain: Muse Spark lags peers on some benchmarks and monetization is unproven, the large GPU commitment raises execution and cash‑flow risk, and insiders have recently sold shares—factors to watch.

Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META - Get Free Report)'s stock price rose 2.6% during mid-day trading on Thursday . The company traded as high as $637.50 and last traded at $628.39. Approximately 18,911,352 shares were traded during trading, an increase of 17% from the average daily volume of 16,103,116 shares. The stock had previously closed at $612.42.

Key Stories Impacting Meta Platforms

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

• Positive Sentiment: Meta unveiled Muse Spark, the first model from its Superintelligence Labs — positioned as a multimodal, multi-agent LLM that the company says improves on prior models and will be integrated across apps (a clear signal of renewed AI momentum). Meta unveils first AI model from superintelligence team
• Positive Sentiment: Meta expanded a long-term cloud compute agreement with CoreWeave to roughly $21 billion through 2032, locking in large-scale GPU capacity needed to train and run advanced AI — helps de-risk supply for AI rollout. CoreWeave signs $21 billion AI cloud deal with Meta
• Positive Sentiment: Meta is partnering with PayPal to enable on-platform, one-tap purchases on Facebook/Instagram — a commerce tie-up that could accelerate monetization of AI-driven shopping features. PayPal Stock (PYPL) Surges on New Deal with Meta for Facebook Shopping
• Positive Sentiment: Bank of America reiterated a Buy on Meta and kept an $885 price target after the Muse Spark launch, signaling buy-side support from a major broker. Meta keeps Bank of America analysts bullish with early Muse Spark launch
• Neutral Sentiment: Macro and market context: Meta’s move helped lift major tech indices amid easing geopolitical concerns and oil-driven Fed uncertainty — favorable market tone is supporting the stock alongside company-specific news. S&P500 and Nasdaq 100: Meta Jump Drives US Stocks Today, Oil Shapes Forecast
• Neutral Sentiment: Some analysts trimmed price targets but kept bullish ratings (e.g., KeyCorp and Rosenblatt reduced targets but maintained Overweight/Buy), reflecting confidence with more conservative estimates — watch revisions for directional signal. Analyst price target notes
• Negative Sentiment: Questions remain on differentiated performance and monetization: coverage notes Muse Spark still lags rivals on some benchmarks (coding) and Meta must prove the model drives new revenue streams. Meta's long-awaited AI model is finally here. But can it make money?
• Negative Sentiment: Big GPU commitments raise cost and execution risk — the $21B CoreWeave spend secures capacity but represents material future cash outlays that could pressure free cash flow if revenue lift lags. Meta commits to spending additional $21 billion with CoreWeave as AI costs keep rising
• Negative Sentiment: Smaller items: an Erste Group tweak lowered FY2027 EPS slightly and Meta has pulled certain law-firm recruiting ads after legal setbacks — minor headwinds to monitor. MarketBeat Meta summary (includes analyst/eps notes)

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

META has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft boosted their price objective on Meta Platforms from $880.00 to $920.00 and gave the stock a "buy" rating in a report on Thursday, January 29th. TD Cowen reiterated a "buy" rating on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Tuesday, January 13th. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $785.00 to $820.00 and gave the company a "buy" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Sanford C. Bernstein reiterated an "outperform" rating and issued a $900.00 price target (up from $870.00) on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Finally, Evercore lifted their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $875.00 to $900.00 and gave the company an "outperform" rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Four research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-eight have issued a Buy rating and eight have issued a Hold rating to the company's stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock has a consensus rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $839.13.

Meta Platforms Trading Up 2.6%

The firm has a market capitalization of $1.59 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 26.74, a P/E/G ratio of 0.89 and a beta of 1.31. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27, a current ratio of 2.60 and a quick ratio of 2.60. The firm's 50-day simple moving average is $632.71 and its 200 day simple moving average is $655.87.

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

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

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

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Meta Platforms news, CFO Susan J. Li sold 56,571 shares of the business's stock in a transaction 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 transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 926 shares of the business's stock in a transaction on Monday, March 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $605.38, for a total transaction of $560,581.88. Following the sale, the chief operating officer directly owned 13,335 shares in the company, valued at approximately $8,072,742.30. The trade was a 6.49% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 160,931 shares of company stock valued at $102,997,526. 13.61% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Meta Platforms

A number of hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently modified their holdings of META. Westchester Capital Management Inc. bought a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the third quarter worth $26,000. RHL Group LLC bought a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the fourth quarter worth $28,000. Strategic Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the fourth quarter worth $29,000. Niles Investment Management LLC bought a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the fourth quarter worth $29,000. Finally, Safe Harbor Fiduciary LLC bought a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the fourth quarter worth $42,000. Institutional investors own 79.91% of the company's stock.

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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