Baron Silver Stevens Financial Advisors LLC Acquires 78 Shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Baron Silver Stevens Financial Advisors LLC raised its holdings in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 2.7% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 2,938 shares of the social networking company’s stock after buying an additional 78 shares during the period. Baron Silver Stevens Financial Advisors LLC’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $1,720,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

A number of other hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in META. Fiera Capital Corp increased its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 35.1% during the second quarter. Fiera Capital Corp now owns 27,272 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $13,751,000 after purchasing an additional 7,089 shares during the period. Susquehanna Fundamental Investments LLC acquired a new position in Meta Platforms in the 2nd quarter valued at $1,559,000. Susquehanna International Group Ltd. increased its position in Meta Platforms by 219.0% during the 2nd quarter. Susquehanna International Group Ltd. now owns 11,161 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $5,628,000 after buying an additional 7,662 shares during the period. Ninepoint Partners LP acquired a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms during the second quarter worth $93,000. Finally, Oliver Lagore Vanvalin Investment Group boosted its position in shares of Meta Platforms by 15.8% in the second quarter. Oliver Lagore Vanvalin Investment Group now owns 6,891 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $3,475,000 after acquiring an additional 939 shares during the period. 79.91% of the stock is owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

Several brokerages have weighed in on META. Rosenblatt Securities reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $811.00 price objective on shares of Meta Platforms in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Citigroup boosted their price target on Meta Platforms from $645.00 to $705.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. TD Cowen raised their price objective on Meta Platforms from $600.00 to $675.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 17th. Robert W. Baird upped their target price on Meta Platforms from $605.00 to $630.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, October 31st. Finally, Wolfe Research increased their target price on Meta Platforms from $670.00 to $730.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a report on Friday, January 3rd. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating, thirty-five have issued a buy rating and two have given a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, the company currently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $654.20.

Meta Platforms Stock Performance

Shares of META stock opened at $647.49 on Friday. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.63 trillion, a PE ratio of 30.50, a PEG ratio of 1.18 and a beta of 1.19. The business’s 50 day simple moving average is $601.93 and its 200 day simple moving average is $560.33. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.18, a current ratio of 2.73 and a quick ratio of 2.73. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a one year low of $385.66 and a one year high of $652.00.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last posted its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, October 30th. The social networking company reported $6.03 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates of $5.19 by $0.84. Meta Platforms had a net margin of 35.55% and a return on equity of 35.60%. The company had revenue of $40.59 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $40.21 billion. As a group, research analysts forecast that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 22.96 earnings per share for the current year.

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Friday, December 27th. Stockholders of record on Monday, December 16th were given a dividend of $0.50 per share. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.31%. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Monday, December 16th. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 9.42%.

Insider Activity

In other news, CEO Mark Zuckerberg sold 35,921 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $607.97, for a total transaction of $21,838,890.37. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this link. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 413 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Friday, November 1st. The shares were sold at an average price of $567.58, for a total value of $234,410.54. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now owns 10,294 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $5,842,668.52. This represents a 3.86 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold 568,016 shares of company stock worth $346,031,180 in the last quarter. 13.71% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

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.