Legacy Financial Strategies LLC Increases Holdings in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Legacy Financial Strategies LLC raised its stake in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 4.5% during the 4th quarter, according to its most recent Form 13F filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 1,980 shares of the social networking company’s stock after purchasing an additional 85 shares during the quarter. Legacy Financial Strategies LLC’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $1,186,000 at the end of the most recent quarter.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors also recently modified their holdings of the company. JDM Financial Group LLC purchased a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms during the 3rd quarter valued at about $30,000. Safe Harbor Fiduciary LLC acquired a new stake in Meta Platforms in the third quarter valued at approximately $36,000. Avondale Wealth Management purchased a new stake in shares of Meta Platforms during the fourth quarter valued at approximately $41,000. Cordant Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Meta Platforms during the fourth quarter worth $59,000. Finally, Reston Wealth Management LLC purchased a new position in shares of Meta Platforms in the third quarter valued at $61,000. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 79.91% of the company’s stock.

Wall Street Analysts Forecast Growth

A number of equities analysts have commented on META shares. Truist Financial boosted their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $700.00 to $770.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, January 30th. Sanford C. Bernstein boosted their price target on Meta Platforms from $600.00 to $675.00 and gave the stock an “outperform” rating in a research note on Friday, October 25th. Morgan Stanley raised their price objective on Meta Platforms from $600.00 to $660.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research note on Monday, January 13th. Wolfe Research upped their target price on Meta Platforms from $670.00 to $730.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research report on Friday, January 3rd. Finally, Arete Research raised shares of Meta Platforms to a “hold” rating in a research report on Friday, January 24th. Two research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have assigned a hold rating, thirty-five have given a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to data from MarketBeat, Meta Platforms has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $717.90.

Meta Platforms Trading Up 1.1 %

Shares of Meta Platforms stock opened at $736.67 on Friday. The business has a fifty day simple moving average of $638.73 and a 200-day simple moving average of $582.68. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a fifty-two week low of $414.50 and a fifty-two week high of $740.91. The firm has a market cap of $1.87 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 30.80, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.46 and a beta of 1.20. The company has a quick ratio of 2.98, a current ratio of 2.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last announced its quarterly earnings data on Wednesday, January 29th. The social networking company reported $8.02 earnings per share (EPS) for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $6.75 by $1.27. Meta Platforms had a net margin of 37.91% and a return on equity of 38.17%. During the same period in the previous year, the company posted $5.33 EPS. On average, equities analysts forecast that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.66 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Increases Dividend

The business also recently declared a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, March 26th. Investors of record on Friday, March 14th will be given a $0.525 dividend. This is a positive change from Meta Platforms’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. The ex-dividend date is Friday, March 14th. This represents a $2.10 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 0.29%. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio (DPR) is 8.36%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Meta Platforms news, insider Nicholas Clegg sold 7,296 shares of Meta Platforms stock in a transaction that occurred on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $553.48, for a total transaction of $4,038,190.08. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 38,695 shares in the company, valued at approximately $21,416,908.60. The trade was a 15.86 % decrease in their position. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, CFO Susan J. Li sold 18,644 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, November 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $553.55, for a total transaction of $10,320,386.20. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now directly owns 46,769 shares in the company, valued at approximately $25,888,979.95. This trade represents a 28.50 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. In the last quarter, insiders have sold 793,070 shares of company stock valued at $504,185,108. 13.71% of the stock is owned by corporate insiders.

Meta Platforms 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.