Facebook Faces Tanking Shares, Wiping $200B Off Value – WWD

FacebookMeta’s are facing historical bad news: After social media The giant reported a series of mixed earnings results, including the first consecutive decline in daily active users, executives waking up and noticing the group’s share price. down more than 26% on Thursday night. They have not recovered yet.

Shares closed Wednesday at $323, but were up early Thursday at $238.90. At press time, they stand at $237.61. All in all, Wall Street’s confusion has blown Meta’s value by about $200 billion, like the biggest single-day drop in market history.

But it speaks to Meta’s massive operation that even this may not derail the company. After all, it doesn’t exactly harm money. Owner of Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Meta Quest, the group is still worth more than $670 billion, with Q4 2021 revenue of $33.67 billion, including ad revenue of $32.6 billion. Both numbers beat analysts’ expectations.

However, Meta also revealed a downward trajectory for daily users and rather disappointing earnings per share, with $3.67 sliding in line with expectations. Even worse, the company forecasted the current quarter to be lower than analysts expected, with revenue estimates between $27 billion and $29 billion, to $30.25 billion. It then warned investors that Apple’s changes to iOS, which have become a thorn in the side of Meta by complicating or hindering ad targeting, would also be costly in the long run. this year – with billions of dollars.

Chief Financial Officer David Wehner said on a call with analysts that “the impact of iOS as a whole is a big windfall on our business in 2022 on orders of $10 billion.” , describing it as “a pretty significant headwind.”

Now the pressure is on to strengthen the business, both in the short and long term. It could mean making all of its platforms work more efficiently together behind the scenes, while also garnering more attention on Instagram, which is its crown jewel. Now, the company has taken care of creators and advertisers with social commerce incentives and promotions. Now, it may need to ramp up these and other efforts, while it tries to stop the bloodshed of its users.

But the long game is the metaverse, so it has to keep the momentum going at the same time. It rebranded Oculus, its virtual reality outfit, and brought it to the center of the company, while work continued on Project Nazaré, its upcoming augmented reality headset. Meta can lose a lot, but can’t lose any of it. Because the stakes seem to have skyrocketed.