Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) Stock Price Down 0.6% After Insider Selling

Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) shares fell 0.6% on Wednesday after an insider sold shares in the company. The company traded as low as $495.19 and last traded at $496.84. 2,738,503 shares were traded during trading, a decline of 84% from the average session volume of 16,944,990 shares. The stock had previously closed at $499.76.

Specifically, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 585 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $498.59, for a total transaction of $291,675.15. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 37,813 shares in the company, valued at $18,853,183.67. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. In other news, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 585 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, April 16th. The shares were sold at an average price of $498.59, for a total transaction of $291,675.15. Following the completion of the transaction, the insider now owns 37,813 shares in the company, valued at $18,853,183.67. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 9,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, January 22nd. The stock was sold at an average price of $388.90, for a total transaction of $3,500,100.00. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 79,935 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $31,086,721.50. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 1,421,182 shares of company stock worth $677,574,550. Insiders own 13.75% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Ratings Changes

META has been the subject of a number of recent analyst reports. Raymond James increased their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $450.00 to $550.00 and gave the company a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, February 2nd. Oppenheimer increased their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $525.00 to $585.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Monday, April 8th. Citigroup increased their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $525.00 to $590.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $375.00 to $550.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Friday, February 2nd. Finally, Piper Sandler raised their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $525.00 to $600.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, April 11th. One analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, two have issued a hold rating, thirty-eight have given a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $519.53.

Meta Platforms Stock Up 1.5 %

The business has a fifty day moving average of $494.29 and a 200 day moving average of $397.43. The stock has a market cap of $1.28 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 33.68, a P/E/G ratio of 1.26 and a beta of 1.20. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12, a current ratio of 2.67 and a quick ratio of 2.67.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last announced its quarterly earnings results on Thursday, February 1st. The social networking company reported $5.33 EPS for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $4.82 by $0.51. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 29.48% and a net margin of 28.98%. The company had revenue of $40.11 billion for the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $39.12 billion. During the same quarter last year, the company posted $3.00 earnings per share. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 24.7% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, equities analysts predict that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 20.18 earnings per share for the current year.

Meta Platforms Announces Dividend

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

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Meta Platforms

Hedge funds and other institutional investors have recently added to or reduced their stakes in the stock. Vanguard Group Inc. grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 1.7% in the fourth quarter. Vanguard Group Inc. now owns 186,349,346 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $65,960,215,000 after acquiring an additional 3,104,550 shares during the last quarter. FMR LLC grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 4.0% in the third quarter. FMR LLC now owns 130,809,908 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $39,270,443,000 after acquiring an additional 5,001,647 shares during the last quarter. Capital World Investors grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 2.5% in the fourth quarter. Capital World Investors now owns 38,054,513 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $13,469,906,000 after acquiring an additional 927,491 shares during the last quarter. Morgan Stanley grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 3.4% in the third quarter. Morgan Stanley now owns 36,277,772 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $10,890,950,000 after acquiring an additional 1,184,978 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Norges Bank acquired a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the fourth quarter worth $4,223,148,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 79.91% of the company’s stock.

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.