Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) Receives $827.60 Consensus PT from Analysts

Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) has earned an average recommendation of “Moderate Buy” from the forty-eight research firms that are covering the stock, MarketBeat Ratings reports. Seven equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold recommendation, thirty-seven have assigned a buy recommendation and four have issued a strong buy recommendation on the company. The average twelve-month price target among brokerages that have updated their coverage on the stock in the last year is $827.6047.

Several research firms have weighed in on META. Benchmark lowered shares of Meta Platforms from a “buy” rating to a “hold” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 30th. Barclays lowered their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $810.00 to $770.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Thursday, October 30th. Jefferies Financial Group cut their price objective on Meta Platforms from $950.00 to $910.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday, October 30th. Guggenheim restated a “buy” rating and issued a $800.00 target price (up previously from $725.00) on shares of Meta Platforms in a research note on Monday, July 28th. Finally, Mizuho dropped their target price on Meta Platforms from $925.00 to $815.00 and set an “outperform” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday, October 30th.

Meta Platforms Stock Down 0.7%

Shares of Meta Platforms stock opened at $597.69 on Friday. Meta Platforms has a 1 year low of $479.80 and a 1 year high of $796.25. The company has a market cap of $1.51 trillion, a P/E ratio of 26.40, a P/E/G ratio of 1.34 and a beta of 1.20. The company has a current ratio of 1.98, a quick ratio of 1.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.15. The stock has a 50-day moving average price of $707.36 and a 200 day moving average price of $706.50.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, October 29th. The social networking company reported $7.25 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $6.74 by $0.51. The company had revenue of $51.24 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $49.34 billion. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 39.35% and a net margin of 30.89%.The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 26.2% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $6.03 EPS. Meta Platforms has set its Q4 2025 guidance at EPS. As a group, analysts expect that Meta Platforms will post 26.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Monday, September 29th. Investors of record on Monday, September 22nd were given a dividend of $0.525 per share. This represents a $2.10 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, September 22nd. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 9.28%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Meta Platforms

In other Meta Platforms news, CFO Susan J. Li sold 6,875 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Saturday, November 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $609.46, for a total value of $4,190,037.50. Following the completion of the sale, the chief financial officer directly owned 88,370 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $53,857,980.20. The trade was a 7.22% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 516 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, November 10th. The stock was sold at an average price of $631.00, for a total transaction of $325,596.00. Following the transaction, the insider owned 26,721 shares in the company, valued at approximately $16,860,951. This trade represents a 1.89% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. Insiders have sold 28,424 shares of company stock valued at $18,868,377 over the last three months. 13.61% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Meta Platforms

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. Westchester Capital Management Inc. acquired a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the third quarter worth $26,000. Bare Financial Services Inc acquired a new position in Meta Platforms in the 2nd quarter valued at $30,000. MJT & Associates Financial Advisory Group Inc. bought a new position in Meta Platforms in the 1st quarter worth $33,000. Evergreen Private Wealth LLC lifted its position in Meta Platforms by 237.5% during the 2nd quarter. Evergreen Private Wealth LLC now owns 54 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $40,000 after acquiring an additional 38 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Briaud Financial Planning Inc bought a new stake in Meta Platforms during the second quarter valued at about $42,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 79.91% of the company’s stock.

Meta Platforms Company Profile

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.