Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) Trading 3.1% Higher After Analyst Upgrade

Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) shares traded up 3.1% during trading on Thursday after Sanford C. Bernstein raised their price target on the stock from $535.00 to $590.00. Sanford C. Bernstein currently has an outperform rating on the stock. Meta Platforms traded as high as $510.86 and last traded at $509.54. 5,337,613 shares traded hands during trading, a decline of 68% from the average session volume of 16,917,754 shares. The stock had previously closed at $494.17.

Other research analysts have also issued reports about the company. KeyCorp raised their price target on Meta Platforms from $465.00 to $575.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Tuesday, January 30th. Monness Crespi & Hardt raised their price target on Meta Platforms from $370.00 to $540.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, February 2nd. JMP Securities raised their price target on Meta Platforms from $410.00 to $500.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, February 2nd. Guggenheim raised their price target on Meta Platforms from $380.00 to $520.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Friday, February 2nd. Finally, Wells Fargo & Company lowered their price target on Meta Platforms from $609.00 to $600.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a report on Wednesday, April 3rd. One research analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have given a hold rating, thirty-eight have given a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the company currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $519.53.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other news, COO Javier Olivan sold 490 shares of Meta Platforms stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 23rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $488.03, for a total transaction of $239,134.70. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 79,944 shares in the company, valued at approximately $39,015,070.32. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. In other news, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 585 shares of Meta Platforms stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 9th. The stock was sold at an average price of $522.00, for a total transaction of $305,370.00. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 38,398 shares in the company, valued at approximately $20,043,756. The sale was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 490 shares of Meta Platforms stock in a transaction dated Friday, February 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $488.03, for a total value of $239,134.70. Following the sale, the chief operating officer now owns 79,944 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $39,015,070.32. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last ninety days, insiders sold 1,421,182 shares of company stock worth $677,574,550. 13.75% of the stock is currently owned by company insiders.

Institutional Inflows and Outflows

A number of institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in META. Norges Bank bought a new position in shares of Meta Platforms in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $4,223,148,000. Morgan Stanley bought a new position in shares of Meta Platforms in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $4,072,543,000. Moneta Group Investment Advisors LLC bought a new position in shares of Meta Platforms in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $1,796,633,000. Legal & General Group Plc bought a new position in shares of Meta Platforms in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $1,731,491,000. Finally, FMR LLC raised its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 4.0% in the 3rd quarter. FMR LLC now owns 130,809,908 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $39,270,443,000 after acquiring an additional 5,001,647 shares in the last quarter. 79.91% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Meta Platforms Trading Up 1.5 %

The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12, a quick ratio of 2.67 and a current ratio of 2.67. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $494.29 and a 200 day simple moving average of $397.43. The company has a market capitalization of $1.28 trillion, a P/E ratio of 33.68, a P/E/G ratio of 1.28 and a beta of 1.20.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 1st. The social networking company reported $5.33 EPS for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $4.82 by $0.51. The company had revenue of $40.11 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $39.12 billion. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 29.48% and a net margin of 28.98%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 24.7% on a year-over-year basis. During the same period in the previous year, the business posted $3.00 EPS. Sell-side analysts expect that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 20.06 earnings per share for the current year.

Meta Platforms Announces Dividend

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, March 26th. Shareholders of record on Thursday, February 22nd were given a $0.50 dividend. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.40%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Wednesday, February 21st. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio is currently 13.42%.

Meta Platforms Company Profile

Meta Platforms, Inc engages in the development of products that enable people to connect and share with friends and family through mobile devices, personal computers, virtual reality headsets, and wearables worldwide. It operates in two segments, Family of Apps and Reality Labs. The Family of Apps segment offers Facebook, which enables people to share, discuss, discover, and connect with interests; Instagram, a community for sharing photos, videos, and private messages, as well as feed, stories, reels, video, live, and shops; Messenger, a messaging application for people to connect with friends, family, communities, and businesses across platforms and devices through text, audio, and video calls; and WhatsApp, a messaging application that is used by people and businesses to communicate and transact privately.