Look forward to a tech huge earnings night ahead with Microsoft and Meta on deck and discussing initial key takeaways on @CNBCOvertime at 4 pm with @jonfortt @MorganLBrennan ?????
— Dan Ives (@DivesTech) October 30, 2024
Meta Platforms beat third-quarter earnings expectations on Wednesday, but the company’s stock fell in premarket trading Thursday due to plans for significant capital expenditure growth in 2025. Meta reported earnings per share of $6.03 on revenue of $40.5 billion, surpassing Wall Street’s expectations of $5.25 EPS on $40.2 billion in revenue. In the same quarter last year, the company saw EPS of $4.50 on revenue of $34.1 billion.
Meta earnings up to a record $40 billion, beat Wall Street estimates, but stocks downhttps://t.co/1pfsR1bM3q via @NYTimes
— Nalin Mehta (@nalinmehta) October 31, 2024
Advertising revenue met expectations at $39.8 billion, while Meta’s Reality Labs segment, which includes sales of its Quest augmented reality headsets, saw revenue of $270 million, falling short of the expected $312 million. The segment also reported a loss of $4.4 billion.
Meta’s earnings and expenditure outlook
wall street is happy that meta's big spending on AI is bringing in more money this year
wall street is not happy that meta's big spending on AI will cost it more money next yearhttps://t.co/nCgKzUHqrJ
— rat king ? (@MikeIsaac) October 30, 2024
Meta CFO Susan Li said in a statement, “We anticipate our full-year 2024 capital expenditures will be in the range of $38-40 billion, updated from our prior range of $37-40 billion. We expect a significant acceleration in infrastructure expense growth next year as we recognize higher growth in depreciation and operating expenses of our expanded infrastructure fleet.”
Meta has quickly become a key player in artificial intelligence, rivaling tech giants like Microsoft, Google, and Amazon. The company’s AI strategy includes rolling out its Llama family of models across consumer and advertiser products and offering the platform as open-source software.
Despite advancements, Meta reported $9.2 billion in capital expenditures for the quarter, highlighting the significant costs associated with its ambitious projects. The company also faces ongoing legal challenges, including an FTC antitrust lawsuit and claims that its platforms are harmful to teen mental health. CEO Mark Zuckerberg emphasized the company’s continued focus on innovation and growth, despite the financial and legal hurdles.
