Facebook showed the results. And what a treat! Euphoria on the stock exchange. Zuckerberg triumphs

For Mark Zuckerberg, the week that is just ending is a series of ups and downs. On Wednesday, the Facebook founder had to explain himself extensively to the US Senate and the victims’ families.

Only a day had passed, and “Zuck” could already open the champagne. In the last quarter, its revenues amounted to $40.1 billion, which means an increase of as much as 25% year on year. During the same period, costs decreased by 8%. to $23.73 billion, and operating margin more than doubled to 41 percent. Even more impressive was the more than three-fold increase in net income from $4.65 billion to $14 billion.

Financial results for Q4 2023 Meta

As for earnings per share, it amounted to $5.33 compared to $4.96 expected by analysts. Their forecasts were also exceeded by the number of daily active users (2.11 billion against the expected 2.08 billion) and the average revenue per user ($13.12 against $12.81).

We’ve had a good quarter in which our community and business continue to grow. We have made great progress in realizing our vision of developing artificial intelligence and the metaverse

– Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement.

A historic day. Meta will pay a dividend for the first time. Euphoria on the stock market

This is not the end of good news for the creator of Facebook. In a statement published on Thursday, Meta also announced that it would pay shareholders a dividend of 50 cents per share for the first time in history. At the same time, the company announced a share buyback worth USD 50 billion.

This information caused real euphoria on the market. On Thursday, Meta’s shares on the American NASDAQ stock exchange rose by more than 15 percent in after-hours trading.

Meta Investing.com

What influenced such excellent results? In a conversation with analysts, the company’s financial director, Susan Li, emphasized that the biggest revenue growth drivers come from areas such as e-commerce, entertainment and games.

Large Chinese e-commerce companies had a significant impact on the financial recovery of Mark Zuckerberg’s concern. This includes, among others: about start-ups Temu and Shein, which have recently invested huge amounts of money in advertising on Facebook and Instagram. As Li revealed, revenues from advertisers from China accounted for as much as 10 percent of the company’s total sales last year.

Mark Zuckerberg repents and apologizes. “You’ve got blood on your hands”

On the night from Wednesday to Thursday, the head of the Meta company, Mark Zuckerberg, was questioned before the US Senate.

You have a product that kills people – Republican senator Lindsey Graham said directly to Mark Zuckerberg. He also stated that the Meta boss has “blood on his hands”.

Is there any reason we shouldn’t sue your company?

asked another Republican senator, Josh Hawley. He also asked if Zuckerberg wanted to apologize to the families of the victims present in the room. The American billionaire turned towards them and said:

I’m sorry for everything you had to go through. No one should have to go through what happened to your families.

Zuckerberg also stated that their experiences are one of the reasons Meta has invested so much “to ensure that no one ever again has to go through the experiences that your families had to go through.”