Cottage Street Advisors LLC Buys 237 Shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META)

Cottage Street Advisors LLC lifted its stake in shares of Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ:META) by 12.1% in the 4th quarter, Holdings Channel reports. The fund owned 2,190 shares of the social networking company’s stock after acquiring an additional 237 shares during the quarter. Cottage Street Advisors LLC’s holdings in Meta Platforms were worth $1,282,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other hedge funds and other institutional investors have also made changes to their positions in the company. JDM Financial Group LLC bought a new position in shares of Meta Platforms during the 3rd quarter worth approximately $30,000. Safe Harbor Fiduciary LLC bought a new position in Meta Platforms in the third quarter valued at $36,000. Millstone Evans Group LLC acquired a new stake in Meta Platforms in the 4th quarter valued at $40,000. Avondale Wealth Management bought a new stake in Meta Platforms during the 4th quarter worth about $41,000. Finally, Cordant Inc. acquired a new position in shares of Meta Platforms during the 4th quarter worth about $59,000. 79.91% of the stock is currently owned by institutional investors and hedge funds.

Insider Activity at Meta Platforms

In other news, CEO Mark Zuckerberg sold 35,921 shares of the firm’s stock in a transaction on Friday, January 3rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $603.98, for a total transaction of $21,695,565.58. The transaction was disclosed in a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is accessible through this hyperlink. Also, insider Jennifer Newstead sold 921 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Tuesday, March 25th. The stock was sold at an average price of $627.05, for a total transaction of $577,513.05. Following the completion of the sale, the insider now directly owns 31,182 shares in the company, valued at approximately $19,552,673.10. This represents a 2.87 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders sold a total of 584,823 shares of company stock worth $386,274,777 in the last quarter. 13.71% of the stock is owned by insiders.

Wall Street Analyst Weigh In

META has been the topic of a number of recent research reports. Wells Fargo & Company lifted their target price on Meta Platforms from $685.00 to $752.00 and gave the company an “overweight” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. KeyCorp dropped their price objective on Meta Platforms from $750.00 to $710.00 and set an “overweight” rating on the stock in a research note on Tuesday, March 18th. Pivotal Research raised their target price on shares of Meta Platforms from $800.00 to $875.00 and gave the company a “buy” rating in a research note on Thursday, January 30th. Bank of America upped their price target on shares of Meta Platforms from $710.00 to $765.00 and gave the stock a “buy” rating in a research report on Thursday, January 30th. Finally, Rosenblatt Securities reiterated a “buy” rating and issued a $811.00 price target on shares of Meta Platforms in a research note on Monday, January 27th. Two equities research analysts have rated the stock with a sell rating, four have given a hold rating, thirty-five have assigned a buy rating and two have issued a strong buy rating to the stock. Based on data from MarketBeat, Meta Platforms currently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $718.31.

Meta Platforms Price Performance

META stock opened at $602.58 on Friday. Meta Platforms, Inc. has a 1 year low of $414.50 and a 1 year high of $740.91. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16, a current ratio of 2.98 and a quick ratio of 2.98. The stock has a market cap of $1.53 trillion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 25.19, a P/E/G ratio of 1.42 and a beta of 1.23. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $655.95 and a 200 day simple moving average of $607.98.

Meta Platforms (NASDAQ:META) last announced 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 period in the previous year, the business posted $5.33 earnings per share. Research analysts anticipate that Meta Platforms, Inc. will post 26.7 EPS for the current fiscal year.

Meta Platforms Increases Dividend

The company also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which was paid on Wednesday, March 26th. Stockholders of record on Friday, March 14th were paid a $0.525 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend was Friday, March 14th. This represents a $2.10 annualized dividend and a dividend yield of 0.35%. This is an increase from Meta Platforms’s previous quarterly dividend of $0.50. Meta Platforms’s dividend payout ratio is currently 8.78%.

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.