Meta The shares surged into extended trading on Wednesday after the company reported fourth-quarter revenue that beat estimates and announced a $40 billion share buyback. Here are the results.
- Earnings: $1.76 per share
- Returned: $32.17 billion vs. $31.53 billion expected, according to Refinitiv
The company also reported restructuring charges for its Family of Apps segment and its Reality Labs unit of $3.76 billion and $440 million, respectively, during the fourth quarter of 2022. As a result of these charges, it is difficult to compare the company’s earnings per share to analyst estimates of $2.22. per share.
Here are some other key numbers:
- Daily Active Users (DAU): 2 billion against 1.99 billion expected, according to StreetAccount
- Monthly Active Users (MAU): 2.96 billion vs. 2.98 billion expected, according to StreetAccount
- Average revenue per user (ARPU): $10.86 vs $10.63 expected, according to StreetAccount
Fourth-quarter revenue fell 4% from a year earlier, marking a third straight quarter of sales decline. The company’s costs and expenses climbed 22% year-over-year to $25.8 billion.
England’s Anwar Almojarkesh (L) and Alan Chalabi (R) pose for a photo at Meta (formerly Facebook) headquarters in Menlo Park, California on November 9, 2022.
Josh Edelson | AFP | Getty Images
Meta said it expects first-quarter revenue of between $26 billion and $28.5 billion. Analysts had expected sales of $27.1 billion, according to Refinitv. Sales for the first quarter of 2021 were $27.9 billion. Should Meta reach the top of its guidance range, the company could end its streak of year-over-year declines.
“Our community continues to grow and I’m thrilled with the strong engagement in our apps,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement. “Our management theme for 2023 is ‘the year of efficiency’ and we are focused on becoming a stronger and more agile organization.”
Meta said its workforce grew 20% year-over-year to 86,482 as of December 31, 2022. That number includes much of the more than 11,000 workers Meta said it would lay off in November. last.
The company expects its total spending in 2023 to be between $89 billion and $95 billion, down from its earlier forecast of $94 billion to $100 billion for the year. Meta attributed the adjustment to “anticipated slower growth in payroll expenses and cost of revenue.”
Meta also said it was cutting its capital expenditure estimate for the year to be between $30 billion and $33 billion, from $34 billion to $37 billion. This is partly due to the company spending less money building data centers. Instead, Meta said it was turning to a different type of data center architecture meant to be more cost effective while acting as the backbone for its various AI projects.
Meta announced on Wednesday that it had authorized a $40 billion increase in its share buyback plan. The company repurchased $27.9 billion of its stock last year.
Earlier this week, Snap reported fourth-quarter earnings that missed sales, sending its shares tumbling. Although much smaller than Meta, Snap faces some of the same challenges, including slowing online ad spending, increased competition from TikTok, and a weakened ad targeting system due to the iOS 2021 privacy update. ‘Apple.
Alphabet and Amazon will wrap up earnings reports for major online ad platforms on Thursday, followed by pinterest next week.
Meta shares fell more than 60% last year as Zuckerberg struggled to sell Wall Street on his plan to pivot the company to the yet-to-be-developed world of the Metaverse. Zuckerberg said the metaverse, which would include virtual reality and augmented reality technologies, could represent the next big way people interact.
The big bet has frustrated investors, who fear the company is focusing too much on a futuristic business as its core advertising business struggles to revive growth. Meta’s Reality Labs unit, home to Metaverse ambitions, lost $4.28 billion in the fourth quarter, bringing its total operating loss for the year to $13.72 billion.
Meta said last year that “Reality Labs’ operating losses in 2023 will increase significantly year over year.”
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