Post by firoj1414 on Feb 14, 2024 5:44:38 GMT -5
Meta founder and Mark Zuckerberg speaks during the Meta Connect event at Meta headquarters in Menlo Park, California, on September 27, 2023. Josh Edelson | AFP | fake images Shares of Facebook's parent company Meta jumped on Friday, after the company reported it tripled its fourth-quarter earnings and issued its first dividend. At around 6 a.m. ET, Meta's stock price was up about 17% in US premarket trading. Revenue rose 25% in Meta's fourth quarter, from $32.2 billion a year earlier. This is the fastest growth rate of any period since mid-2021 and comes amid a rebound in the online advertising market. Meta's net income more than tripled to $14 billion from $4.65 billion a year earlier. First dividend Meta said it would pay investors a dividend of 50 cents per share on March 26, in the company's first cash dividend. This comes after cash and equivalents rose to billion at the end of 2023, from billion a year earlier.
Meta also announced a $50 billion share buyback. Investors praised the dividend announcement. Ben Barringer, technology analyst at Quilter Cheviot, said this represented a “symbolic moment and indicates the story of change Meta has undergone since its difficulties in 2022.” "Mark Zuckerberg is showing that he wants to bring shareholders with him and is highlighting that Meta is now Singapore Email List a mature, grown-up company," Barringer said in emailed comments. Investors have also focused on Meta's moves in the artificial intelligence space. The company has a stake in the AI field with its LLaMA large language model, a competitor to Microsoft-backed OpenAI's GPT-4. Barringer called Meta a "secret AI winner" and said the company's AI, even if not on display, "will better serve advertisers and make ads more relevant to users.
Cash dividends are a rare step for technology companies, which tend to be valued by investors for their ability to achieve high growth rates that require cash investments back into the business. The 'year of efficiency' bears fruit Meta CEO Zuckerberg has made a big push to make 2023 a “year of efficiency” for the company. Several investors had questioned its projects in 2022 in areas such as virtual reality and the metaverse, which was an incredibly expensive initiative for the company. Meta has been deep in cost-cutting mode over the past year, responding to the changing tide of sentiment around once-darling tech stocks. Those cost-cutting measures appear to have paid off. Meta reported a doubling of its operating margin, to 41%. Meanwhile, the company's expenses decreased 8% year over year to $23.73 billion. This is because Meta drastically reduced its workforce and laid off 20,000 people during.
Meta also announced a $50 billion share buyback. Investors praised the dividend announcement. Ben Barringer, technology analyst at Quilter Cheviot, said this represented a “symbolic moment and indicates the story of change Meta has undergone since its difficulties in 2022.” "Mark Zuckerberg is showing that he wants to bring shareholders with him and is highlighting that Meta is now Singapore Email List a mature, grown-up company," Barringer said in emailed comments. Investors have also focused on Meta's moves in the artificial intelligence space. The company has a stake in the AI field with its LLaMA large language model, a competitor to Microsoft-backed OpenAI's GPT-4. Barringer called Meta a "secret AI winner" and said the company's AI, even if not on display, "will better serve advertisers and make ads more relevant to users.
Cash dividends are a rare step for technology companies, which tend to be valued by investors for their ability to achieve high growth rates that require cash investments back into the business. The 'year of efficiency' bears fruit Meta CEO Zuckerberg has made a big push to make 2023 a “year of efficiency” for the company. Several investors had questioned its projects in 2022 in areas such as virtual reality and the metaverse, which was an incredibly expensive initiative for the company. Meta has been deep in cost-cutting mode over the past year, responding to the changing tide of sentiment around once-darling tech stocks. Those cost-cutting measures appear to have paid off. Meta reported a doubling of its operating margin, to 41%. Meanwhile, the company's expenses decreased 8% year over year to $23.73 billion. This is because Meta drastically reduced its workforce and laid off 20,000 people during.