Sovran Advisors LLC Acquires New Position in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Sovran Advisors LLC purchased a new stake in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) in the 4th quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The institutional investor purchased 5,031 shares of the social networking company’s stock, valued at approximately $2,990,000.

Several other hedge funds have also made changes to their positions in the company. Geode Capital Management LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Meta Platforms by 1.5% in the 3rd quarter. Geode Capital Management LLC now owns 48,160,608 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $27,470,870,000 after acquiring an additional 698,884 shares during the last quarter. Jennison Associates LLC lifted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 1.9% during the 3rd quarter. Jennison Associates LLC now owns 14,440,868 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $8,266,531,000 after buying an additional 263,063 shares in the last quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. lifted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 0.9% during the 3rd quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 13,827,565 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $7,915,451,000 after buying an additional 118,298 shares in the last quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC lifted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 57,001.5% during the 3rd quarter. International Assets Investment Management LLC now owns 9,517,111 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $5,447,975,000 after buying an additional 9,500,444 shares in the last quarter. Finally, Franklin Resources Inc. lifted its holdings in Meta Platforms by 2.8% during the 3rd quarter. Franklin Resources Inc. now owns 6,946,755 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $4,101,602,000 after buying an additional 186,728 shares in the last quarter. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 79.91% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have commented on META. Morgan Stanley increased their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $600.00 to $660.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Monday, January 13th. Roth Mkm lifted their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $620.00 to $635.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, October 31st. Truist Financial lifted their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $700.00 to $770.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Bank of America lifted their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $710.00 to $765.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, Oppenheimer lifted their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $650.00 to $800.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have given a hold rating, thirty-five have issued a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. Based on data from MarketBeat, the company presently has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $717.90.

Meta Platforms Trading Up 1.1 %

Meta Platforms stock opened at $736.67 on Monday. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 12-month low of $414.50 and a 12-month high of $740.91. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.87 trillion, a PE ratio of 30.80, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.46 and a beta of 1.20. The firm has a 50 day simple moving average of $638.73 and a 200-day simple moving average of $584.28. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a current ratio of 2.98 and a quick ratio of 2.98.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last released its earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The social networking company reported $8.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping analysts’ consensus estimates of $6.75 by $1.27. Meta Platforms had a return on equity of 38.17% and a net margin of 37.91%. During the same quarter last year, the company earned $5.33 EPS. As a group, equities research analysts expect that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.66 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, March 26th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 14th will be paid a dividend of $0.525 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 14th. This is a positive change from Meta Platforms’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. This represents a $2.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a yield of 0.29%. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio is currently 8.36%.

Insider Activity

In other Meta Platforms news, CEO Mark Zuckerberg sold 35,921 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Tuesday, December 3rd. The stock was sold at an average price of $607.97, for a total transaction of $21,838,890.37. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which can be accessed through this hyperlink. Also, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 905 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, November 26th. The stock was sold at an average price of $565.30, for a total transaction of $511,596.50. Following the sale, the insider now owns 37,790 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $21,362,687. This represents a 2.34 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 751,033 shares of company stock worth $480,911,671 over the last 90 days. 13.71% of the stock is owned by company insiders.

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.