Meta Platforms, Inc. $META Position Boosted by Keystone Investors PTE Ltd.

Keystone Investors PTE Ltd. increased its position in shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 3.6% during the third quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 38,775 shares of the social networking company’s stock after acquiring an additional 1,340 shares during the quarter. Meta Platforms makes up approximately 3.3% of Keystone Investors PTE Ltd.’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 10th biggest position. Keystone Investors PTE Ltd.’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $28,476,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other institutional investors also recently bought and sold shares of META. Westchester Capital Management Inc. purchased a new position in Meta Platforms during the third quarter worth about $26,000. Bare Financial Services Inc purchased a new stake in Meta Platforms in the 2nd quarter valued at about $30,000. Knuff & Co LLC acquired a new position in shares of Meta Platforms during the 2nd quarter valued at about $44,000. Spurstone Advisory Services LLC purchased a new position in shares of Meta Platforms during the 2nd quarter worth about $59,000. Finally, Evergreen Private Wealth LLC boosted its position in shares of Meta Platforms by 64.8% in the third quarter. Evergreen Private Wealth LLC now owns 89 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $65,000 after acquiring an additional 35 shares during the last quarter. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Meta Platforms Price Performance

Shares of META stock opened at $660.41 on Friday. The firm has a fifty day simple moving average of $655.36 and a 200-day simple moving average of $682.50. The company has a market capitalization of $1.67 trillion, a PE ratio of 28.10, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.04 and a beta of 1.30. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a twelve month low of $479.80 and a twelve month high of $796.25. The company has a current ratio of 2.60, a quick ratio of 2.60 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 28th. The social networking company reported $8.88 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $8.16 by $0.72. The firm had revenue of $59.89 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $58.33 billion. Meta Platforms had a net margin of 30.08% and a return on equity of 38.61%. The firm’s quarterly revenue was up 23.8% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $8.02 EPS. Equities research analysts anticipate that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.7 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Announces Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 26th. Shareholders of record on Monday, March 16th will be paid a dividend of $0.525 per share. This represents a $2.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 16th. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 8.94%.

Meta Platforms News Summary

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

• Positive Sentiment: Signed a multiyear AI content‑licensing deal with News Corp that provides paid access to news content for training/retrieval — supports AI product quality and reduces legal/quality risk around training data. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Created a new applied AI engineering organization to speed model development and partner with its Superintelligence Lab — signals accelerated product rollout and continued R&D investment that can boost ad/product monetization. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Erste Group upgraded META from “hold” to “buy”, adding a positive analyst catalyst that can support demand in the stock.
• Neutral Sentiment: Company presentation at Morgan Stanley TMT conference provided additional management commentary and analyst color — useful for positioning but not an immediate catalyst. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Arete Research reaffirmed a “neutral” rating, offering little directional pressure today.
• Negative Sentiment: Under EU antitrust pressure, Meta will allow rival AI chatbots onto WhatsApp in Europe (via its Business API) for a fee for the next 12 months — a concession that reduces immediate regulatory risk but highlights EU scrutiny and could erode WhatsApp exclusivity. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Large insider sales disclosed this week — CFO Susan Li sold ~56,571 shares (~$36.5M) and COO Javier Olivan also sold shares — which can create headline pressure and short‑term selling even if plan‑driven. Read More. • Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Regulatory/reputational pressure from Indonesia, which issued a “stern warning” over disinformation and gambling content and pressed for greater algorithm transparency — potential compliance costs or restrictions in a large market. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Operational risks surfaced: recent U.S. user outages (short‑term engagement/ad impression risk) and reports Meta scrapped its second‑generation Olympus AI chip effort — the latter could raise execution risk and greater reliance on external GPU suppliers. Read More. • Read More.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Meta Platforms news, CFO Susan J. Li sold 56,571 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $644.70, for a total value of $36,471,323.70. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this hyperlink. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 926 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, March 2nd. The shares were sold at an average price of $637.21, for a total transaction of $590,056.46. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer directly owned 16,113 shares in the company, valued at $10,267,364.73. This represents a 5.43% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold 160,927 shares of company stock worth $103,155,254 in the last three months. 13.61% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

Several brokerages recently commented on META. Raymond James Financial dropped their price target 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. Sanford C. Bernstein reissued an “outperform” rating and set a $900.00 price objective (up from $870.00) on shares of Meta Platforms in a research note on Thursday, January 29th. Evercore increased their target price on Meta Platforms from $875.00 to $900.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Barclays reissued an “overweight” rating and set a $800.00 price target (up from $770.00) on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Finally, Royal Bank Of Canada restated an “outperform” rating and issued a $810.00 price objective on shares of Meta Platforms in a report on Thursday, January 29th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-nine have given a Buy rating and seven have assigned a Hold rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Meta Platforms has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $844.44.

Meta Platforms 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.