Meta

Facebook parent Meta saw its stock plunge in after-hours trading on Wednesday following second-quarter earnings results that came in below expectations, ...

Though most analysts remain bullish about the company’s long-term growth, some remain cautious about the company’s “ ability to sustain profits” amid a challenging environment in the short-term. The company noted it faced “weak advertising demand environment” throughout the second quarter, citing the “broader macroeconomic uncertainty” as a driving factor. Meta has lost roughly half of its market value this year, with the stock down 50%, amid the wider market selloff that has hit the tech sector especially hard.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg says Meta will slow hiring and tighten its budget. Soaring inflation, interest rate hikes and other economic woes have affected the ...

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Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, reported its first-ever yearly decline in revenue as a public company. Its second-quarter earnings ...

“I think we’re going to come through this period as a stronger and more disciplined organization.” Meta reported that 2.88 billion now use its suite of social apps — Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, and WhatsApp — every day, an increase of 4 percent from a year ago. On a call with analysts, Zuckerberg said that the percentage of content people see in Facebook and Instagram that comes from accounts they don’t follow will more than double next year.

The Federal Trade Commission is seeking to block virtual reality giant Meta and its controlling shareholder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg from acquiring Within ...

A federal court complaint and request for preliminary relief has been filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California to halt the transaction. The complaint further alleges that the mere possibility of Meta’s entry has likely influenced competition in the virtual reality dedicated fitness app market. The acquisition of the Beat Games studio gave Meta control of the wildly popular app Beat Saber. The company’s virtual reality empire includes the top-selling device, a leading app store, seven of the most successful developers, and one of the best-selling apps of all time. The Federal Trade Commission is seeking to block virtual reality giant Meta and its controlling shareholder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg from acquiring Within Unlimited and its popular virtual reality dedicated fitness app, Supernatural. Meta, formerly known as Facebook, is already a key player at each level of the virtual reality sector. As part of its app expansion, Meta purchased seven of the most successful virtual reality development studios, and now has one of the largest first-party virtual reality content catalogues in the world.

The move is a potential blow to Meta's metaverse efforts and signals a shift in how the Federal Trade Commission is approaching tech deals.

A F.T.C. spokeswoman said the agency had not filed such a complaint and declined to comment further on the agency’s strategy. But Nikhil Shanbhag, an associate general counsel for Meta, said in the blog post that the games weren’t competitors. Ms. Khan, 33, who was appointed by President Biden last year to acclaim from the left, has tried to make good on expansive promises to rein in corporate power. Christine Wilson, a Republican commissioner at the agency, said she was one of the two votes against the lawsuit. He has also authorized the purchase of roughly half a dozen other virtual reality or gaming studios over the past three years. For Mr. Zuckerberg, the F.T.C. lawsuit is a setback. The F.T.C.’s lawsuit is part of a broader wave of actions against Meta and other large tech companies like Google, Apple and Amazon, which have increasingly faced scrutiny for their power and dominance. The F.T.C.’s lawsuit is highly unusual and pushes the boundaries of antitrust law. The Justice Department has also sued Google over whether the company abused a monopoly over online search. The F.T.C.’s request for an injunction puts Ms. Khan on a collision course with Mark Zuckerberg, Meta’s chief executive, who is also named as a defendant in the request. Ms. Khan has argued that regulators must stop competition and consumer protection violations when it comes to the bleeding edge of technology, including virtual and augmented reality, and not just in areas where the companies have already become behemoths. He has poured billions of dollars into building products for virtual and augmented reality, betting that the immersive world of the metaverse is the next technology frontier.

It was the first time the social media giant's revenue had fallen since it went public a decade ago, as it confronts increased regulatory scrutiny and a ...

On Tuesday, Meta’s Reality Labs hardware division, which makes virtual reality headsets and other products, said it would increase the price of its marquee V.R. headset, the Quest 2, by $100. “Meta is a company that has shown extraordinary resilience. Mr. Zuckerberg said he believed it was only a matter of time before Meta figured out how to better make money from Reels. His goal, he said, was to eventually make more money from Reels, which is not as lucrative for Instagram as the app’s other advertising formats. Investments in artificial intelligence recommendation algorithms have also driven more people to use the service and for longer periods, the company said. Sheryl Sandberg, Meta’s chief operating officer, also appeared on Wednesdays company earnings call, the last of her 14-year tenure. That exceeded analysts’ expectations that the company was losing visitors. Google, Twitter and Snap, which rely on online advertising, have also said this month that they experienced reduced demand for advertising because of the slowing global economy. The company attributed its most recent lackluster financial results to weaker demand for digital advertising and the broader economic uncertainty. Some investors are skeptical that the investments will pay off in the long term. On Wednesday, Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook, reported a 1 percent decline in quarterly revenue from the previous year. “The situation seems worse than it did a quarter ago.”

The federal government accused Meta of “trying to buy its way to the top” through its acquisitions.

The FTC, whose chair Lina Khan has been heavily critical of Meta and other tech giants’ power, has already sued Meta (then known as Facebook) in federal court for broader antitrust violations, arguing the company has engaged in “anticompetitive conduct and unfair methods of competition,” including by acquiring Instagram and WhatsApp. A federal judge initially dismissed the FTC’s challenge, finding the agency’s lawsuit was “legally insufficient” and “light on specific factual allegations.” The FTC then re-filed its complaint with more evidence, however, and the court has allowed the case to move forward, which could potentially result in Meta having to be broken up and WhatsApp and Instagram becoming separate companies again if the FTC succeeds. “The idea that this acquisition would lead to anticompetitive outcomes in a dynamic space with as much entry and growth as online and connected fitness is simply not credible,” Meta said in a statement. Meta’s second quarter earnings will be released later on Wednesday, and the company and Zuckerberg could address the FTC’s new legal challenge during its earnings call.

The lawsuit echoes issues progressive critics have said the FTC should have raised in Facebook's acquisitions of Instagram and WhatsApp roughly a decade ...

A Meta spokesperson said in a statement the case "is based on ideology and speculation, not evidence. When the monopolization case was first filed in 2020, Facebook's chief counsel said the FTC was looking for a "do-over" of its original reviews of the Instagram and WhatsApp mergers, which happened years earlier. Meta previously sought for that lawsuit to be dismissed, though it is still moving forward in a federal court after the judge allowed the FTC to revise its complaint. The progressive tech critic was sworn in as chair in June 2021 but the agency lacked a tie-breaking vote until May this year when President Joe Biden's final nominee to the commission was confirmed. "But Meta chose to buy market position instead of earning it on the merits. "Meta already owns a best-selling virtual reality fitness app, and it had the capabilities to compete even more closely with Within's popular Supernatural app," Newman said.

Meta's second-quarter earnings report comes after a 50% plunge in the company's stock price this year.

Meta is promoting Susan Li, the company's current vice president of finance, to be CFO. Those costs jumped 10% year-over-year to $3.6 billion in the second quarter. A hefty amount of spending is going into Meta's Reality Labs unit, which is responsible for developing the metaverse and related virtual reality and augmented reality technologies. Earlier this week, Meta raised the price of its Quest 2 VR headset by $100, citing rising production and shipping costs. Meta said that its headcount increased 32% from a year earlier to 83,553. Revenue in the second quarter fell almost 1% from a year earlier. The earnings call was the last for Sheryl Sandberg, Meta's operating chief, who announced in June that she's leaving the company after 14 years. However, despite Facebook's investment in Reels, the product doesn't generate revenue as efficiently as Instagram Stories and the main news feed. "These continue to be turbulent times for the global economy," Sandberg said. Facebook's troubling results follow a trend started last week by rivals Snap and reported disappointing second-quarter numbers, and executives cited economic and mobile platform challenges that have permeated the online ad market. That unit has been hurt by Apple's iOS privacy update last year, limiting Meta's ability to track users, and by a weakening economy that's led some companies to slash their ad budgets. The shares dropped 3.8% in extended trading.

Federal regulators have taken legal action to block Facebook parent Meta and its CEO Mark Zuckerberg from acquiring virtual reality company Within Unlimited ...

“By attacking this deal … the FTC is sending a chilling message to anyone who wishes to innovate in VR. We are confident that our acquisition of Within will be good for people, developers, and the VR space.” Fueled by the popularity of its top-selling Quest headsets, Meta’s Quest Store has become a leading U.S. app platform with more than 400 apps available to download, it says. The regulators said that Meta already is a key player “at each level of the virtual reality sector,” owning the top-selling device, a leading app store, seven of the most successful developers in the sphere and one of the best-selling apps of all time.

The company's stock dropped slightly in after-hours trading following the results, suggesting Wall Street was largely expecting the weak earnings report. The ...

The company is investing billions on its metaverse plans that will likely take years to pay off — and as part of its plan renamed itself Meta last fall. Meta said Wehner is being promoted to chief strategy officer, where he will oversee the company’s strategy and corporate development. “This outlook reflects a continuation of the weak advertising demand environment we experienced throughout the second quarter, which we believe is being driven by broader macroeconomic uncertainty,” finance chief David Wehner said in a statement. Meta is in the midst of a corporate transformation that will take years to complete. “The year-over-year drop in quarterly revenue signifies just how quickly Meta’s business has deteriorated,” said Insider Intelligence analyst Debra Aho Williamson in an email. Now, it’s unlikely to reach that figure.”

It appears the economy has begun a downturn, said Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta Platforms, on the company's Q2 earnings call. · Meta, Google and other technology ...

"Our plan is to steadily reduce headcount growth over the next year," he said. Advertisers will go where they get the highest return on investment and ability to drive their business. "Despite the current challenges, I'm very confident for the long term," Sandberg said. It's always hard to predict how deep or how long these cycles will be, but I'd say that the situation seems worse than it did a quarter ago." Earlier on Wednesday the U.S. Federal Reserve raised its benchmark rate by 75 basis points, and Fed Chair Jerome Powell said consumer spending growth has slowed meaningfully. "Engagement trends on Facebook have generally been stronger than we anticipated and strong Reels growth is continuing to drive engagement across Facebook and Instagram," Zuckerberg said on a conference call with analysts.

This deal brings more competition and innovation to VR more generally. The FTC is wrong on the facts and the law. Today, the ...

In such a world, the FTC has no answer to the most basic question — how could Meta’s acquisition of a single fitness app in a dynamic space with many existing and future players possibly harm competition? Third, the FTC believes that just the possibility that we might eventually develop our own VR fitness app somehow keeps existing participants in check and is reason enough to block this deal. The FTC also insinuates that Meta is trying to buy VR apps in an effort to “control” the VR ecosystem. The FTC rests its arguments on a number of flawed premises and unsupported assumptions that do not stand up to scrutiny. Under US law, the FTC is required to prove that an acquisition would “substantially lessen competition” in order to successfully block a deal. By attacking this deal in a 3-2 vote, the FTC is sending a chilling message to anyone who wishes to innovate in VR. We are confident that our acquisition of Within will be good for people, developers and the VR space.

Meta revenue slipped to $28.8 billion in the second quarter, missing the $28.9 billion average analyst estimate. The company's forecast for the current quarter ...

The company’s forecast for the current period also fell short. Shares dropped more than 4% in late trading. Meta Platforms Inc., the social media giant that includes Facebook and Instagram, reported its first-ever quarterly sales decline, citing advertisers’ shrinking budgets.

Driving the news: The tech giant told investors Wednesday that it's planning to cut costs, slow investments and reduce head count as it braces for what CEO Mark ...

By the end of next year, that percentage is expected to double. Earlier this year, the Facebook app lost roughly 1 million daily active users — its first ever year-over-year user drop. - "This is a period that demands more intensity," he said. "I think we're in the pretty early days of doing that." It also starting testing new featureson Instagram that offer a similar experience. The big picture: Facebook's transition from a feed that connects friends to a "content discovery engine" marks the end of the social networking era, and in some ways, the end of Meta's unprecedented growth.

The Federal Trade Commission on Wednesday moved to block Facebook-parent Meta from acquiring virtual reality company Within, offering the clearest signal ...

The agency pointed to a publicly-reported email Zuckerberg sent to Meta executives in which he is said to have told them it is "critical for the company to also be 'completely ubiquitous in killer apps,'" referring to apps that will prove the underlying value of new technologies. The complaint plainly recognizes Meta's potential to dominate the virtual reality space, Slaiman added. "By attacking this deal in a 3-2 vote, the FTC is sending a chilling message to anyone who wishes to innovate in VR. We are confident that our acquisition of Within will be good for people, developers and the VR space." Meta, in a blog post responding to the complaint, said Supernatural is not comparable to Beat Saber and thus the deal poses no competitive harm. "And this is not just our take -- Within's leadership team strongly believes its competitors are the Pelotons and other established fitness brands of the world, not Beat Saber or other casual VR games." More recently, it has made a slew of VR-related acquisitions, including game development platform Unit 2 Games and Beat Games, the developer behind Beat Saber. Meta announced its planned acquisition of Within for an undisclosed sum in October 2021.

Facebook parent Meta plans to partner with an outside group to survey the race of Instagram customers in hopes of better understanding who is using its ...

Facebook has also eliminated the ability to target those kinds of ads by age or gender and requires that location targeting have a minimum 15-mile radius. That's all the more important as Metaincreasingly relies on machine learning and AI algorithmsto decide who sees what on its services. - The company committed in 2018 toconduct a civil rights audit. - Meta partnered with a firm called Oasis Partners to ensure Meta will have access to this information only at the aggregate level. The company has posted more detailed information on its methodologyhere. By working with a third party it aims to both protect privacy and ensure customers are more comfortable sharing their information.

Shares of Meta fell 8% on Thursday, a day after the company released second quarter earnings that missed on the top and bottom lines.

"The Reels monetization ramp seems slow," UBS' Lloyd Walmsley said in a note to investors. Meta also issued a disappointing third-quarter forecast, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on a call with analysts that the company reduce headcount as it prepares for the economic slowdown. He added that the "economic downturn will have a broad impact on the digital advertising business," which has already been hit by Apple's privacy changes.

The social media company's Reality Labs segment, focused on augmented and virtual reality, notched a $2.8 billion loss in the latest quarter.

Wall Street had been expecting a per-share profit of $2.56 from revenue of $29 billion. Meta (ticker: META) reported a second-quarter per-share profit of $2.46 from revenue of $28.8 billion, which was down from $29.1 billion in the same quarter of 2021, representing the company’s first-ever quarterly decline in sales. reported second-quarter earnings late Wednesday that were dismal enough to add to the headwinds stocks were facing on Thursday. But the company’s large losses in one key segment—the metaverse—shouldn’t obscure that Wall Street remains upbeat on the company’s prospects in that high-growth business.

Lina Khan may set off a shift in how Washington regulates competition by filing cases in tech areas before they mature. She faces an uphill climb.

The F.T.C. is reviewing other tech deals, including Microsoft’s $70 billion acquisition of the gaming company Activision and Amazon’s $3.9 billion merger with One Medical, a national chain of primary care clinics. That would hobble competition and consumers, the agency said. For Ms. Khan, winning the lawsuit may be less of a priority than showing it’s possible to file against a tech deal while it is still early. Since then, Meta has acquired around 10 virtual-reality app makers, such as the maker of a Viking combat game, Asgard’s Wrath, and several first-person shooter and sports games. That could then embolden tech giants to acquire their way into new lines of businesses. Silicon Valley tech executives said that moving to block a deal in an embryonic area of technology might stifle innovation and spook technologists from taking bold leaps in new areas. Regulators have been reluctant to try to stop corporate mergers by relying on the theory that competition and consumers will be harmed in the future. Meta said the F.T.C. was applying antitrust law incorrectly. Regulators have mostly rubber-stamped the purchases of start-ups by tech giants, such as Google’s 2006 deal to buy YouTube and Facebook’s 2012 acquisition of Instagram, because those markets were still emerging. But the pivot is causing internal disruption and uncertainty. The F.T.C. said such early action was justified because Meta’s deal would probably eliminate competition in the young virtual-reality market. “We’re trying to be forward looking, anticipating problems and taking fast action,’’ Ms. Khan said in an interview last month.