Centaurus Financial Inc. Sells 1,502 Shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. $META

Centaurus Financial Inc. cut its holdings in shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 4.1% during the 1st quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The fund owned 35,382 shares of the social networking company’s stock after selling 1,502 shares during the period. Meta Platforms makes up 1.0% of Centaurus Financial Inc.’s portfolio, making the stock its 16th biggest position. Centaurus Financial Inc.’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $20,243,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other large investors also recently bought and sold shares of META. Auto Owners Insurance Co grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 76,587.7% in the fourth quarter. Auto Owners Insurance Co now owns 105,292,277 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $69,502,379,000 after acquiring an additional 105,154,977 shares during the period. Norges Bank purchased a new position in shares of Meta Platforms during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $22,152,075,000. Vanguard Group Inc. lifted 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 purchasing an additional 7,269,279 shares during the period. Corient Private Wealth LLC lifted 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 purchasing an additional 4,537,076 shares during the period. Finally, State Street Corp boosted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 5.1% in the fourth quarter. State Street Corp now owns 90,841,345 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $59,963,463,000 after purchasing an additional 4,395,763 shares during the last quarter. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Key Stories Impacting Meta Platforms

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

• Positive Sentiment: Meta’s core advertising business remains strong. Second-quarter revenue increased 28% year over year to $60.8 billion, while ad impressions, pricing, engagement and AI-powered recommendation tools continued to improve. Advantage+ advertising reportedly reached a $75 billion annualized run rate. Meta: Buy The AI Spending Panic
• Positive Sentiment: Several analysts and investment commentators view the selloff as an opportunity, arguing that Meta’s advertising engine can fund its AI investments and that AI is already improving ad performance, personalization and user engagement. Meta also highlighted potential enterprise AI products, personal AI agents and new applications. Buy Meta’s Earnings Drop
• Positive Sentiment: Despite reductions, major firms retained bullish ratings and price targets, including UBS at $715, Baird at $750, Cantor Fitzgerald at $680 and Rosenblatt at $883. The targets imply substantial long-term upside if Meta converts AI spending into monetization. Meta Given New Price Target at Baird
• Neutral Sentiment: The earnings miss was partly affected by approximately $2.4 billion in legal charges and $1.2 billion in severance costs. Excluding these items, supporters argue that underlying profitability was healthier, but reported margins still declined.
• Negative Sentiment: Meta reported $6.18 in quarterly EPS, below expectations near $7.19, while free cash flow fell to only $784 million from $31.9 billion in operating cash flow as AI data-center capital expenditures surged. Investors remain unconvinced that the spending will generate adequate returns soon. Tech’s AI Buildout Has Ballooning Price Tag
• Negative Sentiment: Future AI-related lease obligations reached $279 billion, increasing concerns about balance-sheet commitments and execution risk. Additional legal and regulatory pressure includes a wrongful-death lawsuit alleging that social-media companies harmed minors, plus an Indian police case involving Meta’s India chief over Facebook posts depicting Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Meta’s AI Splurge Lays Bare Its Compute Conundrum

Analyst Ratings Changes

META has been the subject of a number of research analyst reports. KeyCorp cut their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $790.00 to $780.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday. BNP Paribas Exane began coverage on Meta Platforms in a report on Tuesday, June 2nd. They set an “outperform” rating on the stock. Weiss Ratings downgraded Meta Platforms from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a research note on Friday, June 26th. DA Davidson cut their price objective on Meta Platforms from $850.00 to $700.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Thursday. Finally, Wedbush reduced their price objective on Meta Platforms from $671.00 to $595.00 and set a “neutral” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday. Three equities research analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-six have given a Buy rating and eight have issued a Hold rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat, Meta Platforms currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $789.95.

Insider Buying and Selling

In related news, insider Curtis J. Mahoney sold 2,079 shares of Meta Platforms stock in a transaction on Wednesday, May 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $609.92, for a total transaction of $1,268,023.68. Following the transaction, the insider directly owned 1,118 shares in the company, valued at approximately $681,890.56. The trade was a 65.03% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, CFO Susan J. Li sold 9,195 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, May 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $607.84, for a total value of $5,589,088.80. Following the sale, the chief financial officer directly owned 13,186 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,014,978.24. This represents a 41.08% decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale is available in the SEC filing. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. The sale was made to cover tax withholding obligations related to the vesting of equity awards. Insiders sold a total of 39,325 shares of company stock valued at $23,979,087 in the last 90 days. 13.53% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

Meta Platforms Stock Up 3.3%

Shares of META stock opened at $556.71 on Friday. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 12 month low of $520.26 and a 12 month high of $796.25. The stock has a market cap of $1.41 trillion, a P/E ratio of 20.97, a P/E/G ratio of 0.90 and a beta of 1.25. The company has a current ratio of 2.23, a quick ratio of 2.35 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $601.16 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $622.97.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 29th. The social networking company reported $6.18 earnings per share for the quarter, missing the consensus estimate of $7.19 by ($1.01). The business had revenue of $60.80 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $60.22 billion. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 33.18% and a net margin of 29.83%.The firm’s revenue was up 28.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the business posted $7.14 earnings per share. On average, research analysts expect that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 29.4 earnings per share for the current year.

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, June 25th. Investors of record on Monday, June 15th were issued a $0.525 dividend. This represents a $2.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.4%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, June 15th. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is currently 7.63%.

Meta Platforms Company Profile

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.