Wallace Hart LLC Grows Position in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Wallace Hart LLC lifted its holdings in shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 11.9% in the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The institutional investor owned 751 shares of the social networking company’s stock after purchasing an additional 80 shares during the quarter. Meta Platforms accounts for approximately 0.4% of Wallace Hart LLC’s portfolio, making the stock its 11th largest position. Wallace Hart LLC’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $440,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Several other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of META. Ballentine Partners LLC lifted its stake in Meta Platforms by 1.4% during the fourth quarter. Ballentine Partners LLC now owns 58,218 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $34,087,000 after purchasing an additional 808 shares during the last quarter. UMB Bank n.a. raised its holdings in shares of Meta Platforms by 0.6% during the 4th quarter. UMB Bank n.a. now owns 140,585 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $82,314,000 after buying an additional 897 shares in the last quarter. Brueske Advisory Services LLC purchased a new stake in Meta Platforms in the fourth quarter worth approximately $459,000. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. grew its position in Meta Platforms by 0.9% during the third quarter. Charles Schwab Investment Management Inc. now owns 13,827,565 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $7,915,451,000 after acquiring an additional 118,298 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Apollon Financial LLC raised its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 11.1% during the fourth quarter. Apollon Financial LLC now owns 1,479 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $866,000 after acquiring an additional 148 shares in the last quarter. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors.

Insiders Place Their Bets

In related news, COO Javier Olivan sold 413 shares of the stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, December 30th. The shares were sold at an average price of $589.16, for a total transaction of $243,323.08. Following the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 17,514 shares in the company, valued at $10,318,548.24. This represents a 2.30 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at the SEC website. Also, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 905 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, December 17th. The shares were sold at an average price of $626.66, for a total transaction of $567,127.30. Following the sale, the insider now owns 34,725 shares of the company’s stock, valued at approximately $21,760,768.50. This represents a 2.54 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last 90 days, insiders sold 690,689 shares of company stock valued at $451,269,409. 13.71% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have recently issued reports on META. Wolfe Research upped their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $670.00 to $730.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, January 3rd. Wells Fargo & Company upped their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $685.00 to $752.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. The Goldman Sachs Group lifted their price objective on Meta Platforms from $688.00 to $765.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, January 30th. Cantor Fitzgerald increased their target price on Meta Platforms from $720.00 to $790.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a report on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, Jefferies Financial Group lifted their price target on Meta Platforms from $675.00 to $715.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research note on Monday, January 6th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating, thirty-five have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Meta Platforms has an average rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus target price of $719.26.

Meta Platforms Stock Up 2.9 %

Shares of Meta Platforms stock opened at $607.60 on Friday. The company has a 50-day simple moving average of $658.01 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $603.19. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 52-week low of $414.50 and a 52-week high of $740.91. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a quick ratio of 2.98 and a current ratio of 2.98. The stock has a market capitalization of $1.54 trillion, a PE ratio of 25.40, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.42 and a beta of 1.23.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last released its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 29th. The social networking company reported $8.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate 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 period in the previous year, the firm posted $5.33 EPS. On average, analysts anticipate that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Increases Dividend

The firm also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, March 26th. Investors of record on Friday, March 14th will be issued a $0.525 dividend. This represents a $2.10 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.35%. This is an increase from Meta Platforms’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. The ex-dividend date is Friday, March 14th. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is presently 8.78%.

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.