Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) Given New $675.00 Price Target at Sanford C. Bernstein

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) had its price objective boosted by Sanford C. Bernstein from $600.00 to $675.00 in a report issued on Friday morning, Benzinga reports. Sanford C. Bernstein currently has an outperform rating on the social networking company’s stock.

A number of other analysts have also recently commented on META. Stifel Nicolaus lifted their target price on Meta Platforms from $590.00 to $663.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, October 14th. Evercore ISI lifted their target price on Meta Platforms from $550.00 to $600.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research report on Thursday, August 1st. Guggenheim lifted their target price on Meta Platforms from $600.00 to $665.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday, October 7th. Benchmark reiterated a “hold” rating on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Thursday, July 25th. Finally, BMO Capital Markets lifted their target price on Meta Platforms from $475.00 to $525.00 and gave the stock a “market perform” rating in a research report on Wednesday, October 9th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, three have given a hold rating, thirty-five have given a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to data from MarketBeat.com, Meta Platforms currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $621.63.

Meta Platforms Trading Up 0.9 %

META opened at $578.16 on Friday. Meta Platforms has a 52 week low of $296.86 and a 52 week high of $602.95. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $552.03 and a 200-day simple moving average of $511.04. The firm has a market cap of $1.47 trillion, a P/E ratio of 33.21, a P/E/G ratio of 1.42 and a beta of 1.22. The company has a quick ratio of 2.83, a current ratio of 2.83 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, July 31st. The social networking company reported $5.16 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $4.70 by $0.46. The business had revenue of $39.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $38.26 billion. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 34.16% and a net margin of 34.34%. The company’s revenue for the quarter was up 22.1% compared to the same quarter last year. During the same period last year, the firm earned $3.23 earnings per share. On average, equities analysts expect that Meta Platforms will post 21.44 earnings per share for the current year.

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, September 26th. Shareholders of record on Monday, September 16th were issued a dividend of $0.50 per share. This represents a $2.00 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.35%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, September 16th. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 11.49%.

Insider Buying and Selling at Meta Platforms

In other news, CFO Susan J. Li sold 33,018 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, August 27th. The stock was sold at an average price of $517.94, for a total transaction of $17,101,342.92. The sale was disclosed in a legal filing with the SEC, which can be accessed through this link. In other news, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 901 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, August 5th. The stock was sold at an average price of $451.15, for a total transaction of $406,486.15. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now owns 33,324 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $15,034,122.60. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Susan J. Li sold 33,018 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, August 27th. The shares were sold at an average price of $517.94, for a total value of $17,101,342.92. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold a total of 250,817 shares of company stock valued at $132,547,715 over the last three months. 13.71% of the stock is currently owned by insiders.

Institutional Trading of Meta Platforms

Institutional investors have recently made changes to their positions in the stock. ERn Financial LLC lifted its stake in Meta Platforms by 59.0% in the first quarter. ERn Financial LLC now owns 1,652 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $802,000 after acquiring an additional 613 shares during the period. Shulman DeMeo Asset Management LLC lifted its stake in Meta Platforms by 4.6% in the first quarter. Shulman DeMeo Asset Management LLC now owns 5,233 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $2,541,000 after acquiring an additional 229 shares during the period. Hurlow Wealth Management Group Inc. purchased a new stake in Meta Platforms in the first quarter worth $243,000. Thrive Wealth Management LLC lifted its stake in Meta Platforms by 6.6% in the first quarter. Thrive Wealth Management LLC now owns 2,829 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $1,374,000 after acquiring an additional 176 shares during the period. Finally, Lincoln Capital Corp lifted its stake in Meta Platforms by 9.5% in the first quarter. Lincoln Capital Corp now owns 1,205 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $585,000 after acquiring an additional 105 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors 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.