Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META - Get Free Report)'s stock price was down 1.8% during trading on Monday . The company traded as low as $598.08 and last traded at $598.86. Approximately 15,530,417 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 3% from the average daily volume of 16,038,838 shares. The stock had previously closed at $609.63.
Meta Platforms News Roundup
Here are the key news stories impacting Meta Platforms this week:
Wall Street Analyst Weigh In
A number of equities research analysts recently commented on META shares. Raymond James Financial decreased their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $825.00 to $800.00 and set a "strong-buy" rating for the company in a research report on Monday, January 26th. Wall Street Zen upgraded shares of Meta Platforms from a "hold" rating to a "buy" rating in a research note on Saturday, May 2nd. Erste Group Bank lowered shares of Meta Platforms from a "buy" rating to a "hold" rating in a research note on Thursday, April 2nd. UBS Group cut their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $908.00 to $865.00 and set a "buy" rating on the stock in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $765.00 to $770.00 and gave the company an "overweight" rating in a research note on Thursday, April 30th. Four investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-four have assigned a Buy rating and nine have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company has an average rating of "Moderate Buy" and a consensus target price of $840.31.
Read Our Latest Research Report on META
Meta Platforms Price Performance
The stock has a market cap of $1.51 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 21.77, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.07 and a beta of 1.25. The stock's 50 day moving average price is $627.67 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $645.30. The company has a quick ratio of 2.35, a current ratio of 2.35 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.24.
Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META - Get Free Report) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, April 29th. The social networking company reported $10.44 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts' consensus estimates of $6.67 by $3.77. The firm had revenue of $56.31 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $55.56 billion. Meta Platforms had a net margin of 32.84% and a return on equity of 36.93%. The business's quarterly revenue was up 33.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same quarter in the prior year, the business earned $6.43 earnings per share. Equities research analysts forecast that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 29.68 EPS for the current fiscal year.
Meta Platforms Announces Dividend
The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, March 26th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 16th were paid a $0.525 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Monday, March 16th. This represents a $2.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.4%. Meta Platforms's dividend payout ratio is presently 7.63%.
Insiders Place Their Bets
In other news, Director Robert M. Kimmitt sold 580 shares of the stock in a transaction on Wednesday, April 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $667.00, for a total value of $386,860.00. Following the sale, the director owned 3,847 shares in the company, valued at $2,565,949. This represents a 13.10% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 926 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, May 4th. The stock was sold at an average price of $607.74, for a total transaction of $562,767.24. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer owned 7,779 shares in the company, valued at $4,727,609.46. The trade was a 10.64% decrease in their position. Additional details regarding this sale are available in the official SEC disclosure. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Insiders sold 167,676 shares of company stock worth $107,299,848 in the last quarter. Company insiders own 13.61% of the company's stock.
Institutional Trading of Meta Platforms
Several hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in META. Auto Owners Insurance Co grew its position in Meta Platforms by 76,587.7% during the fourth quarter. Auto Owners Insurance Co now owns 105,292,277 shares of the social networking company's stock valued at $69,502,379,000 after buying an additional 105,154,977 shares during the period. Norges Bank acquired a new stake in Meta Platforms during the fourth quarter valued at $22,152,075,000. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its position in Meta Platforms by 3.8% during the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 199,995,630 shares of the social networking company's stock valued at $132,015,115,000 after buying an additional 7,269,279 shares during the period. Corient Private Wealth LLC grew its position in Meta Platforms by 488.1% during the fourth quarter. Corient Private Wealth LLC now owns 5,466,595 shares of the social networking company's stock valued at $3,608,445,000 after buying an additional 4,537,076 shares during the period. Finally, State Street Corp grew its position in Meta Platforms by 5.1% during the fourth quarter. State Street Corp now owns 90,841,345 shares of the social networking company's stock valued at $59,963,463,000 after buying an additional 4,395,763 shares during the period. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 79.91% of the company's stock.
About Meta Platforms
(
Get Free Report)
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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