Bison Wealth LLC Sells 6,526 Shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Bison Wealth LLC lowered its stake in Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 63.1% during the fourth quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The firm owned 3,812 shares of the social networking company’s stock after selling 6,526 shares during the period. Bison Wealth LLC’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $2,232,000 at the end of the most recent reporting period.

Several other hedge funds have also recently bought and sold shares of the company. Howard Capital Management Group LLC raised its holdings in shares of Meta Platforms by 17.9% during the 3rd quarter. Howard Capital Management Group LLC now owns 1,652 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $946,000 after buying an additional 251 shares in the last quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. boosted its position in Meta Platforms by 6.5% during the 3rd quarter. Principal Financial Group Inc. now owns 3,368,361 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $1,928,185,000 after buying an additional 204,412 shares during the period. SOA Wealth Advisors LLC. grew its stake in shares of Meta Platforms by 9.1% in the third quarter. SOA Wealth Advisors LLC. now owns 3,219 shares of the social networking company’s stock worth $1,842,000 after purchasing an additional 269 shares during the last quarter. Aldebaran Financial Inc. grew its position in shares of Meta Platforms by 10.2% in the 3rd quarter. Aldebaran Financial Inc. now owns 2,853 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $1,633,000 after buying an additional 264 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Te Ahumairangi Investment Management Ltd increased its position in Meta Platforms by 9.5% during the 3rd quarter. Te Ahumairangi Investment Management Ltd now owns 17,048 shares of the social networking company’s stock valued at $9,704,000 after purchasing an additional 1,480 shares during the period. 79.91% of the stock is owned by institutional investors.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of equities research analysts have recently commented on META shares. Mizuho upped their price objective on shares of Meta Platforms from $675.00 to $750.00 and gave the company an “outperform” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. BMO Capital Markets upped their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $530.00 to $610.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. Morgan Stanley lowered their price objective on Meta Platforms from $660.00 to $615.00 and set an “overweight” rating for the company in a research report on Thursday, April 17th. Barclays upped their target price on Meta Platforms from $630.00 to $705.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, Guggenheim lowered their target price on Meta Platforms from $750.00 to $675.00 and set a “buy” rating for the company in a report on Tuesday, April 8th. 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 issued a strong buy rating to the company’s stock. According to MarketBeat, the stock has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average price target of $681.95.

Meta Platforms Stock Up 0.9 %

META stock opened at $554.44 on Wednesday. The stock has a market cap of $1.40 trillion, a P/E ratio of 23.18, a P/E/G ratio of 1.42 and a beta of 1.28. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 1-year low of $427.11 and a 1-year high of $740.91. The company has a current ratio of 2.98, a quick ratio of 2.98 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16. The stock’s fifty day simple moving average is $581.11 and its two-hundred day simple moving average is $604.05.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last issued its quarterly earnings results on Wednesday, January 29th. The social networking company reported $8.02 EPS for the quarter, beating analysts’ consensus estimates 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 quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $5.33 EPS. Analysts expect that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.7 EPS for the current year.

Meta Platforms Increases Dividend

The company also recently announced a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 26th. Shareholders of record on Friday, March 14th were paid a $0.525 dividend. The ex-dividend date was Friday, March 14th. This is a boost from Meta Platforms’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. This represents a $2.10 annualized dividend and a yield of 0.38%. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio is currently 8.78%.

Insider Buying and Selling

In other Meta Platforms news, CFO Susan J. Li sold 8,553 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction dated Saturday, February 15th. The stock was sold at an average price of $736.67, for a total transaction of $6,300,738.51. Following the sale, the chief financial officer now owns 51,793 shares in the company, valued at $38,154,349.31. This trade represents a 14.17 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The transaction was disclosed in a document filed with the SEC, which is available at this hyperlink. Also, COO Javier Olivan sold 406 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, April 21st. The stock was sold at an average price of $491.69, for a total value of $199,626.14. Following the completion of the transaction, the chief operating officer now owns 4,608 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $2,265,707.52. The trade was a 8.10 % decrease in their ownership of the stock. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Over the last quarter, insiders have sold 248,463 shares of company stock worth $175,403,314. Corporate insiders own 13.71% of the company’s stock.

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.