Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) Short Interest Down 14.1% in December

Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) saw a significant decrease in short interest during the month of December. As of December 31st, there was short interest totalling 25,190,000 shares, a decrease of 14.1% from the December 15th total of 29,330,000 shares. Currently, 1.2% of the company’s stock are sold short. Based on an average trading volume of 12,110,000 shares, the short-interest ratio is presently 2.1 days.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Meta Platforms news, CEO Mark Zuckerberg sold 35,921 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Wednesday, January 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $616.16, for a total value of $22,133,083.36. The transaction was disclosed in a legal filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, CFO Susan J. Li sold 8,951 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, November 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $577.16, for a total transaction of $5,166,159.16. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 51,591 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $29,776,261.56. This represents a 14.78 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders sold 496,174 shares of company stock valued at $301,408,499. Insiders own 13.71% of the company’s stock.

Hedge Funds Weigh In On Meta Platforms

Institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the company. JDM Financial Group LLC acquired a new position in Meta Platforms in the 3rd quarter valued at about $30,000. Safe Harbor Fiduciary LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $36,000. Avondale Wealth Management purchased a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the 4th quarter valued at approximately $41,000. Halpern Financial Inc. purchased a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $46,000. Finally, West Financial Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms in the 3rd quarter valued at approximately $49,000. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

META has been the topic of a number of research reports. Piper Sandler increased their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $650.00 to $670.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 10th. Mizuho increased their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $650.00 to $675.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Robert W. Baird increased their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $605.00 to $630.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Roth Mkm increased their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $620.00 to $635.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, Truist Financial increased their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $650.00 to $700.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Tuesday, December 17th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating, thirty-five have assigned a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $650.05.

Meta Platforms Stock Performance

META opened at $611.30 on Friday. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.54 trillion, a PE ratio of 28.79, a PEG ratio of 1.22 and a beta of 1.19. Meta Platforms has a twelve month low of $358.61 and a twelve month high of $638.40. The firm’s 50-day moving average price is $595.92 and its 200 day moving average price is $555.25. The company has a current ratio of 2.73, a quick ratio of 2.73 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last posted its earnings results on Wednesday, October 30th. The social networking company reported $6.03 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $5.19 by $0.84. The company had revenue of $40.59 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $40.21 billion. Meta Platforms had a net margin of 35.55% and a return on equity of 35.60%. As a group, sell-side analysts expect that Meta Platforms will post 22.68 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Announces Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, December 27th. Shareholders of record on Monday, December 16th were issued a $0.50 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 16th. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.33%. Meta Platforms’s payout ratio is 9.42%.

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.