Finemark National Bank & Trust Raises Stake in Meta Platforms, Inc. $META

Finemark National Bank & Trust increased its holdings in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 1.7% during the 3rd quarter, Holdings Channel.com reports. The institutional investor owned 57,103 shares of the social networking company’s stock after buying an additional 965 shares during the period. Meta Platforms accounts for about 1.4% of Finemark National Bank & Trust’s portfolio, making the stock its 15th biggest position. Finemark National Bank & Trust’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $41,935,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds have also bought and sold shares of the company. Westchester Capital Management Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the third quarter worth about $26,000. Bare Financial Services Inc purchased a new position in Meta Platforms during the second quarter valued at approximately $30,000. Knuff & Co LLC acquired a new position in Meta Platforms in the second quarter valued at approximately $44,000. Spurstone Advisory Services LLC acquired a new position in Meta Platforms in the second quarter valued at approximately $59,000. Finally, Evergreen Private Wealth LLC boosted its position in Meta Platforms by 64.8% in the 3rd quarter. Evergreen Private Wealth LLC now owns 89 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $65,000 after purchasing an additional 35 shares in the last quarter. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on META shares. Mizuho raised their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $815.00 to $850.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 29th. Truist Financial boosted their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $875.00 to $900.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 29th. KeyCorp lowered their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $875.00 to $835.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Monday, January 26th. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft raised their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $880.00 to $920.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Finally, Scotiabank upped their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $685.00 to $700.00 and gave the stock a “sector perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 29th. Three investment analysts have rated the stock with a Strong Buy rating, thirty-nine have assigned a Buy rating and seven have assigned a Hold rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Meta Platforms currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $844.44.

Meta Platforms Stock Down 2.4%

META stock opened at $644.86 on Friday. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 52 week low of $479.80 and a 52 week high of $796.25. 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 firm has a 50-day simple moving average of $654.99 and a 200-day simple moving average of $681.65. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.63 trillion, a P/E ratio of 27.44, a P/E/G ratio of 1.02 and a beta of 1.30.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 28th. The social networking company reported $8.88 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping 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 firm had revenue of $59.89 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $58.33 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $8.02 earnings per share. The business’s revenue was up 23.8% on a year-over-year basis. Equities analysts forecast that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.7 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Thursday, March 26th. Stockholders of record on Monday, March 16th will be issued a dividend of $0.525 per share. This represents a $2.10 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.3%. The ex-dividend date is Monday, March 16th. Meta Platforms’s payout ratio is currently 8.94%.

Trending Headlines about Meta Platforms

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

• Positive Sentiment: Closed multiyear AI/content and chip-supply deals that should improve model training quality and reduce sourcing risk — supports AI product road map and longer-term ad/engagement upside. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Signed paid content-licensing arrangements (reported coverage highlights a News Corp deal) and created a new applied-AI engineering organization to speed model development — both point to faster commercialization of AI features that can lift ad yields. Read More.
• Positive Sentiment: Prominent investors and some brokers continue to list META as a buy or top idea (e.g., inclusion on Bill Ackman-related lists and select upgrades), supporting demand from long-term investors. Read More.
• Neutral Sentiment: Company presented at investor conferences and several sell‑side reports reiterated valuation/scale arguments — useful for analyst color but not an immediate catalyst. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Wall Street downgrades and cut price targets citing concerns that Meta is “lagging on AI” — raises short-term growth and competition worries and likely contributed to intraday selling pressure. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Large insider sales disclosed: CFO Susan Li sold roughly $36.5M and COO Javier Olivan also executed significant sales — while often planned (tax/vesting), these filers increase headline risk and can create short-term supply. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: Regulatory and competition pressure in Europe and Indonesia — Meta agreed to allow rival AI chatbots on WhatsApp in Europe (for a fee) to head off EU action, and Indonesia issued warnings over disinformation and algorithm transparency, adding compliance and revenue uncertainty in key markets. Read More. Read More.
• Negative Sentiment: 13F filings show several high‑profile managers trimmed or exited META in Q4 — signals profit‑taking and reduced conviction from some large investors. Read More.

Insider Activity

In other Meta Platforms news, CTO Andrew Bosworth sold 8,089 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, February 18th. The stock was sold at an average price of $631.24, for a total transaction of $5,106,100.36. Following the transaction, the chief technology officer owned 2,841 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $1,793,352.84. The trade was a 74.01% decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CFO Susan J. Li sold 56,571 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction 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 SEC filing for this sale provides additional information. Insiders sold 160,927 shares of company stock worth $103,155,254 over the last ninety days. Corporate insiders own 13.61% of the company’s stock.

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.