Artisan Partners Limited Partnership Cuts Stake in Meta Platforms, Inc. $META

Artisan Partners Limited Partnership decreased its position in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 1.0% during the third quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The fund owned 2,265,811 shares of the social networking company’s stock after selling 21,892 shares during the quarter. Meta Platforms accounts for approximately 2.4% of Artisan Partners Limited Partnership’s investment portfolio, making the stock its 5th largest position. Artisan Partners Limited Partnership’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $1,663,966,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also recently modified their holdings of META. Vanguard Group Inc. raised its position in Meta Platforms by 0.8% during the 2nd quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 192,591,101 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $142,149,566,000 after purchasing an additional 1,532,568 shares during the last quarter. State Street Corp increased its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 1.9% during the second quarter. State Street Corp now owns 86,925,674 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $64,158,971,000 after buying an additional 1,650,435 shares during the period. Geode Capital Management LLC raised its holdings in shares of Meta Platforms by 1.3% during the second quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 51,575,209 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $37,902,948,000 after acquiring an additional 682,768 shares in the last quarter. Norges Bank purchased a new stake in Meta Platforms in the second quarter worth $23,155,393,000. Finally, Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. boosted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 1.8% in the second quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 14,489,621 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $10,694,644,000 after acquiring an additional 262,550 shares in the last quarter. 79.91% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities research analysts have recently commented on META shares. BNP Paribas Exane initiated coverage on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Monday, November 24th. They issued an “outperform” rating and a $800.00 target price for the company. DA Davidson raised their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $825.00 to $850.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, January 29th. Wedbush lifted their price objective on Meta Platforms from $880.00 to $900.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Robert W. Baird increased their target price on Meta Platforms from $815.00 to $830.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Finally, Pivotal Research lowered their target price on Meta Platforms from $930.00 to $910.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a research note 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 issued a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $844.44.

Meta Platforms News Summary

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

• Positive Sentiment: News Corp signed a multiyear AI content-licensing deal that gives Meta paid access to US/UK newsroom content for model training and retrieval — reduces legal risk around training data and improves quality of AI outputs. News Corp licensing deal
• Positive Sentiment: Meta is forming a new applied AI engineering organization (flat structure, close partnership with its Superintelligence Lab/Reality Labs) to speed model development — signals continued R&D investment that supports future AI product rollouts and monetization. Applied AI org
• Positive Sentiment: Reports say Meta is testing an AI-powered shopping research tool inside its chatbot — a direct move to expand commerce monetization beyond ads if rolled out at scale. AI shopping tool test
• Neutral Sentiment: Policy/power risk for data centers: the White House discussion on data-center self-supplied power and energy-cost pledges creates regulatory and capex uncertainty for operators (including hyperscalers). It’s a macro/legal issue rather than a Meta-specific earnings shock for now. Data center power policy
• Neutral Sentiment: Analysts and outlets are re‑examining Meta’s valuation after a strong multi‑year run; useful context for positioning but not an immediate catalyst. Valuation analysis
• Negative Sentiment: CFO Susan J. Li sold 56,571 shares (~$36.5M) in a disclosed SEC filing — large insider sales can spook retail investors even if done under pre-set plans. SEC filing – insider sale
• Negative Sentiment: Facebook experienced outages for thousands of U.S. users (Downdetector/Reuters) — a short-term engagement and reputation hit that can transiently pressure ad impressions and sentiment. Outage report
• Negative Sentiment: Reports that Meta scaled back parts of its custom “Olympus” AI accelerator program highlight execution risk and likely greater near‑term reliance on external GPU suppliers — a potential margin/capex and partner-concentration consideration. Chip program pullback

Insider Buying and Selling

In other news, CFO Susan J. Li sold 56,571 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Friday, February 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $644.70, for a total value of $36,471,323.70. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 2,461 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Sunday, February 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $639.77, for a total transaction of $1,574,473.97. Following the sale, the chief operating officer owned 12,108 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,746,335.16. The trade was a 16.89% decrease in their position. The SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders have sold a total of 160,927 shares of company stock worth $103,155,254 in the last quarter. Corporate insiders own 13.61% of the company’s stock.

Meta Platforms Stock Performance

Shares of META opened at $667.73 on Thursday. The company has a quick ratio of 2.60, a current ratio of 2.60 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.27. The stock has a market cap of $1.69 trillion, a P/E ratio of 28.41, a P/E/G ratio of 1.02 and a beta of 1.30. The business’s 50 day moving average price is $655.49 and its 200-day moving average price is $682.65. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 52 week low of $479.80 and a 52 week high of $796.25.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 28th. The social networking company reported $8.88 earnings per share for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $8.16 by $0.72. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 38.61% and a net margin of 30.08%.The company had revenue of $59.89 billion during the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $58.33 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $8.02 EPS. The firm’s revenue for the quarter was up 23.8% on a year-over-year basis. 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 business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 26th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 16th will be given a $0.525 dividend. This represents a $2.10 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Monday, March 16th. Meta Platforms’s payout ratio is currently 8.94%.

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.