Sanford C. Bernstein Cuts Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) Price Target to $565.00

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) had its price target decreased by Sanford C. Bernstein from $590.00 to $565.00 in a research note published on Thursday, Benzinga reports. Sanford C. Bernstein currently has an outperform rating on the social networking company’s stock.

Several other equities research analysts also recently issued reports on the stock. Rosenblatt Securities raised their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $520.00 to $562.00 and gave the company a buy rating in a research note on Thursday. Bank of America raised their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $425.00 to $510.00 and gave the company a buy rating in a research note on Friday, February 2nd. BMO Capital Markets raised their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $397.00 to $450.00 and gave the company a market perform rating in a research note on Friday, February 2nd. Deutsche Bank Aktiengesellschaft cut their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $540.00 to $500.00 and set a buy rating for the company in a research report on Thursday. Finally, Royal Bank of Canada raised their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $400.00 to $565.00 and gave the stock an outperform rating in a research report on Friday, February 2nd. One investment analyst has rated the stock with a sell rating, three have issued a hold rating, thirty-seven have given a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock presently has a consensus rating of Moderate Buy and an average price target of $509.18.

Meta Platforms Price Performance

Shares of NASDAQ META opened at $443.29 on Thursday. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.13 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.46, a PEG ratio of 1.13 and a beta of 1.20. The business has a 50-day moving average of $494.48 and a 200-day moving average of $404.85. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12, a current ratio of 2.68 and a quick ratio of 2.67. Meta Platforms has a fifty-two week low of $229.85 and a fifty-two week high of $531.49.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last issued its earnings results on Wednesday, April 24th. The social networking company reported $4.71 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $4.32 by $0.39. Meta Platforms had a net margin of 32.06% and a return on equity of 32.03%. The business had revenue of $36.46 billion during the quarter, compared to the consensus estimate of $36.28 billion. As a group, sell-side analysts predict that Meta Platforms will post 20.2 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Announces Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Tuesday, March 26th. Stockholders 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 dividend yield of 0.45%. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 11.49%.

Insider Transactions at Meta Platforms

In other news, COO Javier Olivan sold 6,500 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Monday, January 29th. The shares were sold at an average price of $400.00, for a total transaction of $2,600,000.00. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now directly owns 68,935 shares in the company, valued at $27,574,000. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this link. In related news, COO Javier Olivan sold 6,500 shares of the stock in a transaction on Monday, January 29th. The stock was sold at an average price of $400.00, for a total value of $2,600,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 68,935 shares in the company, valued at $27,574,000. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through the SEC website. Also, CTO Andrew Bosworth sold 8,036 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, February 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $473.28, for a total value of $3,803,278.08. Following the completion of the sale, the chief technology officer now owns 18,432 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $8,723,496.96. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last ninety days, insiders sold 1,349,148 shares of company stock worth $649,552,559. Corporate insiders own 13.75% of the company’s stock.

Institutional Trading of Meta Platforms

A number of institutional investors and hedge funds have recently bought and sold shares of the stock. Artemis Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new stake in Meta Platforms during the first quarter valued at $3,156,000. Tenon Financial LLC bought a new stake in Meta Platforms during the first quarter valued at $239,000. Guardian Financial Partners LLC bought a new stake in Meta Platforms during the first quarter valued at $221,000. Treasure Coast Financial Planning bought a new stake in Meta Platforms during the first quarter valued at $203,000. Finally, Finer Wealth Management Inc. boosted its position in Meta Platforms by 3.3% during the first quarter. Finer Wealth Management Inc. now owns 13,558 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $6,583,000 after acquiring an additional 437 shares during the last quarter. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

About Meta Platforms

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.