Flagship Wealth Advisors LLC Acquires New Shares in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Flagship Wealth Advisors LLC bought a new position in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) in the fourth quarter, according to the company in its most recent Form 13F filing with the SEC. The firm bought 457 shares of the social networking company’s stock, valued at approximately $268,000.

Several other hedge funds have also recently modified their holdings of META. Seelaus Asset Management LLC raised its position in Meta Platforms by 0.9% in the 4th quarter. Seelaus Asset Management LLC now owns 1,640 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $960,000 after buying an additional 15 shares during the last quarter. Meredith Wealth Planning grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 0.8% in the fourth quarter. Meredith Wealth Planning now owns 1,873 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $1,097,000 after acquiring an additional 15 shares during the period. Maiden Cove Capital LLC grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 3.2% in the fourth quarter. Maiden Cove Capital LLC now owns 481 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $282,000 after acquiring an additional 15 shares during the period. Stephens Consulting LLC raised its holdings in shares of Meta Platforms by 5.3% during the fourth quarter. Stephens Consulting LLC now owns 317 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $186,000 after purchasing an additional 16 shares during the last quarter. Finally, VeraBank N.A. lifted its position in Meta Platforms by 0.8% during the fourth quarter. VeraBank N.A. now owns 1,954 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $1,144,000 after purchasing an additional 16 shares during the period. Hedge funds and other institutional investors own 79.91% of the company’s stock.

Analyst Upgrades and Downgrades

A number of equities research analysts have weighed in on META shares. Robert W. Baird boosted their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $680.00 to $750.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. UBS Group increased their target price on Meta Platforms from $736.00 to $786.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a report on Thursday, January 30th. BMO Capital Markets boosted their price target on Meta Platforms from $530.00 to $610.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Barclays increased their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $630.00 to $705.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, Rosenblatt Securities restated a “buy” rating and set a $811.00 target price on shares of Meta Platforms in a research report on Monday, January 27th. Two investment analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have issued a hold rating, thirty-five have assigned a buy rating and two have assigned a strong buy rating to the company. According to MarketBeat.com, Meta Platforms currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and a consensus price target of $718.31.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Meta Platforms news, CTO Andrew Bosworth sold 5,060 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Saturday, February 15th. The shares were sold at an average price of $736.67, for a total value of $3,727,550.20. Following the completion of the sale, the chief technology officer now owns 5,139 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $3,785,747.13. This trade represents a 49.61 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 921 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction that occurred on Tuesday, March 18th. The shares were sold at an average price of $600.25, for a total value of $552,830.25. Following the transaction, the insider now directly owns 32,103 shares in the company, valued at approximately $19,269,825.75. This represents a 2.79 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 622,844 shares of company stock worth $409,212,161 over the last three months. 13.71% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Meta Platforms Price Performance

META stock opened at $586.00 on Friday. The company has a fifty day simple moving average of $655.77 and a two-hundred day simple moving average of $604.56. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 52 week low of $414.50 and a 52 week high of $740.91. The company has a quick ratio of 2.98, a current ratio of 2.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. The firm has a market capitalization of $1.48 trillion, a P/E ratio of 24.50, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 1.42 and a beta of 1.23.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last released its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The social networking company reported $8.02 EPS for the quarter, topping 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 last year, the company earned $5.33 earnings per share. Analysts anticipate that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.7 earnings per share for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Increases Dividend

The business also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Wednesday, March 26th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 14th will be given a dividend of $0.525 per share. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Friday, March 14th. This represents a $2.10 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.36%. This is an increase from Meta Platforms’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. Meta Platforms’s payout ratio is currently 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.