Research archive for META

Last night, Meta Platforms (formerly known as Facebook) reported disappointing Q2 numbers, on already low expectations. It was the first time in the company's history that they didn't deliver year-on-year revenue growth, with a decline of 1%. Flat revenue but growing costs resulted in profits falling by 32%. The good news is that they managed to very slightly grow their user base in the face of stiff competition.

According to data put together by the Insider Intelligence team, this year, US adults will spend 25.7% of their social media time on Facebook, down 9.6 percentage points from 2019. Instagram is holding steady at 17.0%. TikTok is the rising star at 16.7%, up from just 4.5% in 2019. This makes sense as people spend less time on older apps as they discover new ones.

In October 2021, Meta, changed its name from Facebook to emphasise its intention to be at the forefront of the metaverse. That's where virtual environments are accessed through 3D interactions, and Mark Zuckerberg's business has been working on it for years.

Facebook (now officially known as Meta Platforms) came to market 10 years ago on the 18th of May, 2012 in what was then the largest IPO in history. The Menlo Park-based social media giant raised $16 billion at a $104 billion valuation. Something that was unheard of back in those days.

Meta Platforms released a decent set of earnings on Wednesday night, showing that its main service, Facebook, added more users than projected. Capital spending was also reined in. The shares surged as much as 19% on these twin surprises. The market clearly approves of these developments, which indicate that the group is dealing with growing competition, maintaining margins and satisfying its advertisers, despite technology and privacy challenges.

The real world is pretty rough right now, so let's delve into the Metaverse for a bit. According to Wikipedia, the Metaverse is a network of 3D virtual worlds focused on social connection. Access to these virtual worlds will happen mostly through augmented reality headsets.

Meta Platforms has confirmed that the company is building the technical functionality that will enable users to mint/create and display their NFTs on Instagram. CEO Mark Zuckerberg said "We're working on bringing NFTs to Instagram in the near term," in a conversation at South by Southwest conference with Shark Tank's Daymond John.

Meta, formerly known as Facebook, released underwhelming numbers on Wednesday night. The street took a dim view of the results because profit missed estimates and there was weak forward growth guidance. Not a great combination.

Meta's Instagram is working on a tool that will encourage users to take a break from mindless scrolling. This new initiative is to help teens with their mental well-being. According to Bloomberg, the photo-sharing app will let users opt to see a pop-up message when they have spent a lot of time looking at a particular topic, suggesting they explore other subjects.

Meta, formerly known as Facebook, has acquired virtual reality fitness developer Within. Within is the Los Angeles-based developer of the popular fitness/workout virtual reality app Supernatural, which is famous for its Beat lightsaber-like devices that individuals use, when wearing VR goggles.

Meta, the company previously known as Facebook, bought VR headset maker Oculus for $2 billion back in 2014. This was their first venture into the world of virtual reality. Last year, they released a fresh set of VR headsets called the Oculus Quest 2 to compete with Sony, their biggest rival.

Facebook had third-quarter results out on Monday evening that were highly satisfactory. Despite some problems with Apple's new iPhone privacy settings which limit user tracking, Facebook posted a 35% rise in third-quarter revenues to $29 billion. Monthly active users on all platforms rose by 6% year-on-year to 2.91 billion. That's not far from half of the world's population.

Facebook has been getting a fair amount of bad press lately. I think the media like to paint them as the bad guys because everyone knows the platform and they are successful, the perfect combination for a villain. As Paul points out above, the group has close to 3 billion users, and the vast majority have a great experience on the platform. Zuckerberg has repeatedly stated that if people were not enjoying themselves, the company would be dead in a few years.

Last night Facebook reminded us all how central its services are to our lives. How many times did you tap on your phone to see if your most recent WhatsApp message was sent? What about scrolling through Instagram hoping to see fresh content come through? Or being sad that you couldn't comment on a post from some misinformed user on Facebook?

Facebook is a stock in US portfolios that has done very well for us. However, some people feel ambivalent about buying the shares because the company is often accused of not correctly policing the content that appears on their social media platforms.