Rosenblatt Securities Issues Pessimistic Forecast for Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) Stock Price

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) had its price target cut by equities researchers at Rosenblatt Securities from $1,015.00 to $883.00 in a research report issued on Thursday, Marketbeat.com reports. The brokerage presently has a “buy” rating on the social networking company’s stock. Rosenblatt Securities’ target price indicates a potential upside of 58.61% from the stock’s previous close.

Several other brokerages also recently commented on META. Needham & Company LLC restated a “hold” rating on shares of Meta Platforms in a research note on Wednesday, July 8th. Susquehanna decreased their price target on Meta Platforms from $900.00 to $650.00 and set a “positive” rating on the stock in a research report on Thursday. Weiss Ratings downgraded shares of Meta Platforms from a “buy (b-)” rating to a “hold (c+)” rating in a report on Friday, June 26th. Mizuho cut their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $850.00 to $835.00 and set an “outperform” rating for the company in a research report on Tuesday, May 5th. Finally, Stifel Nicolaus reduced their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $805.00 to $780.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note on Friday, May 1st. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-six have given a Buy rating and eight have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $789.95.

Meta Platforms Trading Up 3.3%

NASDAQ:META opened at $556.71 on Thursday. Meta Platforms has a 1 year low of $520.26 and a 1 year high of $796.25. The stock’s fifty day moving average price is $601.16 and its two-hundred day moving average price is $622.97. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.32, a current ratio of 2.23 and a quick ratio of 2.35. The company 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.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last announced 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). Meta Platforms had a net margin of 29.83% and a return on equity of 33.18%. The company had revenue of $60.80 billion during the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $60.22 billion. During the same quarter last year, the firm posted $7.14 earnings per share. Meta Platforms’s revenue for the quarter was up 28.0% compared to the same quarter last year. As a group, analysts expect that Meta Platforms will post 29.4 EPS for the current year.

Insider Activity

In other news, Director Robert M. Kimmitt sold 500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Wednesday, July 1st. The stock was sold at an average price of $607.75, for a total value of $303,875.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the director directly owned 3,443 shares in the company, valued at approximately $2,092,483.25. This represents a 12.68% decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. The transaction was executed under a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 trading plan. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 837 shares of the stock in a transaction dated Monday, July 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $607.85, for a total value of $508,770.45. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer owned 6,290 shares in the company, valued at $3,823,376.50. This trade represents a 11.74% decrease in their ownership of the stock. 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. In the last ninety days, insiders have sold 39,325 shares of company stock valued at $23,979,087. Corporate insiders own 13.53% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

Several large investors have recently made changes to their positions in the business. Auto Owners Insurance Co boosted its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 76,587.7% in the 4th 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 purchasing an additional 105,154,977 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Meta Platforms during the 4th quarter valued at $22,152,075,000. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Meta Platforms by 3.8% in the 4th quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 199,995,630 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $132,015,115,000 after purchasing an additional 7,269,279 shares during the period. Corient Private Wealth LLC raised its position in Meta Platforms by 488.1% in the 4th quarter. Corient Private Wealth LLC now owns 5,466,595 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $3,608,445,000 after purchasing an additional 4,537,076 shares during the period. Finally, State Street Corp lifted its stake 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 owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Key Headlines 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

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.