Barlow Wealth Partners Inc. Boosts Stake in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Barlow Wealth Partners Inc. increased its position in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 14.6% in the 3rd quarter, according to its most recent filing with the SEC. The fund owned 1,254 shares of the social networking company’s stock after purchasing an additional 160 shares during the period. Barlow Wealth Partners Inc.’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $733,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Several other institutional investors and hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. Baird Financial Group Inc. increased its position in Meta Platforms by 24.2% in the 4th quarter. Baird Financial Group Inc. now owns 835,972 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $295,901,000 after acquiring an additional 163,067 shares during the period. Gradient Investments LLC increased its position in Meta Platforms by 8.9% in the 2nd quarter. Gradient Investments LLC now owns 72,587 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $36,600,000 after acquiring an additional 5,953 shares during the period. Baillie Gifford & Co. increased its position in Meta Platforms by 14.0% in the 1st quarter. Baillie Gifford & Co. now owns 6,101,501 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $2,962,767,000 after acquiring an additional 748,076 shares during the period. ERn Financial LLC increased its position in Meta Platforms by 59.0% in the 1st quarter. ERn Financial LLC now owns 1,652 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $802,000 after acquiring an additional 613 shares during the period. Finally, Stanley Laman Group Ltd. increased its position in Meta Platforms by 26.5% in the 2nd quarter. Stanley Laman Group Ltd. now owns 1,678 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $846,000 after acquiring an additional 352 shares during the period. 79.91% of the stock is owned by hedge funds and other institutional investors.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

Several equities analysts recently issued reports on the company. Loop Capital boosted their price target on Meta Platforms from $550.00 to $575.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Tuesday, August 6th. DA Davidson assumed coverage on Meta Platforms in a research report on Tuesday, September 10th. They issued a “buy” rating and a $600.00 price target on the stock. UBS Group boosted their price target on Meta Platforms from $635.00 to $690.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research report on Monday. Tigress Financial boosted their target price on Meta Platforms from $575.00 to $645.00 and gave the stock a “strong-buy” rating in a research report on Friday, August 16th. Finally, Evercore ISI boosted 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. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, two have assigned a hold rating, thirty-five have issued a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat, the stock currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $601.08.

Meta Platforms Price Performance

META stock traded down $5.59 on Wednesday, reaching $587.30. The company had a trading volume of 3,345,563 shares, compared to its average volume of 15,396,810. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 1 year low of $279.40 and a 1 year high of $602.95. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.12, a quick ratio of 2.83 and a current ratio of 2.83. The company’s fifty day moving average is $532.05 and its 200 day moving average is $503.76. The company has a market cap of $1.49 trillion, a P/E ratio of 34.05, a PEG ratio of 1.39 and a beta of 1.22.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, July 31st. The social networking company reported $5.16 earnings per share for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $4.70 by $0.46. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 34.16% and a net margin of 34.34%. The company had revenue of $39.07 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $38.26 billion. During the same quarter in the prior year, the company posted $3.23 EPS. The business’s revenue for the quarter was up 22.1% compared to the same quarter last year. On average, research analysts forecast that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 21.36 earnings per share for the current year.

Meta Platforms Dividend Announcement

The firm also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Thursday, September 26th. Shareholders of record on Monday, September 16th were paid a dividend of $0.50 per share. This represents a $2.00 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.34%. The ex-dividend date was Monday, September 16th. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio is presently 11.49%.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In other Meta Platforms news, COO Javier Olivan sold 412 shares of the stock in a transaction on Thursday, July 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $530.81, for a total transaction of $218,693.72. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 6,383 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,388,160.23. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available through this link. In other news, COO Javier Olivan sold 412 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Thursday, July 11th. The stock was sold at an average price of $530.81, for a total transaction of $218,693.72. Following the completion of the sale, the chief operating officer now directly owns 6,383 shares in the company, valued at $3,388,160.23. This represents a 0.00 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the SEC, which is available at this link. Also, CFO Susan J. Li sold 33,018 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, August 27th. The stock was 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 266,332 shares of company stock valued at $139,981,833 in the last quarter. 13.71% of the stock is currently owned by company 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.