Meta Stock Forecast 2025: Is META a Good Buy?

Meta Platforms may have endured a volatile year but its stock price recently hit an all-time high on the back of AI-fuelled enthusiasm.

Facebook’s owner has been enjoying a terrific 2024 until analysts became jittery in the summer of chief executive Mark Zuckerberg’s plan to invest even more heavily in AI.

However, the Meta stock price has since recovered, and many Wall Street analysts believe it could continue rising into 2026.

Here in our Meta stock forecast, we take a look at the company’s plans, analyze how it’s performed over the past 12 months, and reveal the latest META stock predictions of analysts.

Table of Contents Table of Contents

1. Key Takeaways
2. Summary of the Latest META Stock Predictions
3. Meta Platforms (META) Stock Analysis
4. Latest META News: AI Investment Plans
5. Meta Platforms Stock Forecast: What Do Analysts Think?
6. META Stock Predictions 2024, 2025 & Beyond: Where Will the Price Go?
7. The Bottom Line: Should I Invest in Meta?
8. FAQs
9. References

Show Full Guide

Table of Contents

1. Key Takeaways
2. Summary of the Latest META Stock Predictions
3. Meta Platforms (META) Stock Analysis
Show Full Guide
4. Latest META News: AI Investment Plans
5. Meta Platforms Stock Forecast: What Do Analysts Think?
6. META Stock Predictions 2024, 2025 & Beyond: Where Will the Price Go?
7. The Bottom Line: Should I Invest in Meta?
8. FAQs
9. References

Summary of the Latest META Stock Predictions

Meta Platforms (META) Stock Analysis

Let’s start our Meta stock prediction 2025  by looking at how the company’s share price has been performing over various periods.

No one can deny that Meta has been one of the stand-out performers over the past year as the world continues to recognize the growing importance of AI.

The META stock price rose more than 90.80% from $300 in October 2023 to an all-time high closing price of $576.47 at the start of October 2024.

And even though it had slightly come off the boil to $572.81.38 as the market closed on October 2, 2024, analysts are expecting further increases over the coming months.

Overall, the stock price has even increased by 61.83% from the $346.29 level at the start of this year, while it has risen 226% over the past five years.

The company has come a long way since launching as Facebook back in 2024. Its stable of apps now includes Messenger, Instagram and WhatsApp.

In fact, it’s now the seventh largest company in the world with a $1.45 trillion valuation, according to CompaniesMarketCap as of October 2024.

Meta’s Second Quarter Results

Meta announced second-quarter revenue for 2024 came in at $39.07 billion, which was a 22% increase over the $31.99 billion figure for the corresponding period last year.

It also revealed net income was up 73% to $13.5 billion, while there was a similar increase in the diluted earnings per share (EPS).

In a statement, Mark Zuckerberg outlined what he saw as a positive three months for the technology giant.

He said: “We had a strong quarter, and Meta AI is on track to be the most used AI assistant in the world by the end of the year. We’ve released the first frontier-level open source AI model, we continue to see good traction with our Ray-Ban Meta AI glasses, and we’re driving good growth across our apps.”

Cash Dividend

In early September 2024, Meta declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.50 per share of the company’s outstanding Class A and Class B common stock.

It will be payable on September 26, 2024, to stockholders of record as of the close of business on September 16, 2024.

Meta’s Second Quarter 2024 Financial Highlights

Outlook for the Third Quarter: What Can Investors Expect?

The company expects the third quarter’s total revenue to be in the range of $38.5 billion to $41 billion, according to its results announcement.

The full-year 2024 total expenses are predicted to be between $96 billion to $99 billion. This is unchanged from its previous outlook.

“For Reality Labs, we continue to expect 2024 operating losses to increase meaningfully year-over-year due to our ongoing product development efforts and investments to further scale our ecosystem,” it stated.

In addition, full-year 2024 capital expenditures will be in the range of $37 billion to $40 billion, while the company continues to monitor an active regulatory landscape.

“While we continue to refine our plans for next year, we currently expect significant capital expenditures growth in 2025 as we invest to support our artificial intelligence research and product development efforts,” it added.

Meta is announcing its third-quarter results after the market closes on Wednesday, October 30, 2024.

Latest META News: AI Investment Plans

The big Meta news this year has been Zuckerberg’s unwavering commitment to developing Meta’s AI capabilities.

In an earnings call, he highlighted how the company was building a number of different AI services, including those for personal and business users.

He said: “Our goal with Meta AI is to build the world’s leading AI service both in quality and usage.”

Zuckerberg also noted that the initial rollout of Meta AI, the virtual assistant that can be asked questions across its apps and glasses, was going well.

“Tens of millions of people have already tried it,” he said. “The feedback is very positive…We’ve started launching Meta AI in some English-speaking countries, and we’ll roll out in more languages and countries over the coming months.”

Meta Has the Talent Needed

Zuckerberg also insisted that Meta has the “talent, data, and ability” to scale infrastructure to build cutting-edge AI models and services.

“This leads me to believe we should invest significantly more over the coming years to build even more advanced models and the largest scale AI services in the world,” he said.

However, he warned that building leading AI would be a “larger undertaking” than other experiences and was likely to take several years.

“On the upside, once our new AI services reach scale, we have a strong track record of monetizing them effectively,” he added. “There are several ways to build a massive business here, including scaling business messaging, introducing ads or paid content into AI interactions, and enabling people to pay to use bigger AI models and access more compute.”

Meta Platforms Stock Forecast: What Do Analysts Think?

So, what are the Meta stock predictions of analysts?

Meta Is Well-Placed to Drive AI Growth

Markets can be fickle beasts, according to Susannah Streeter, head of money and markets at Hargreaves Lansdown.

She said in the wake of the second-quarter results:

“Just last quarter Meta was slammed for ramping up its AI investment after a period of getting lean. Now, a good quarter on the usual metrics and a promise to invest even more in the AI buildout have been welcomed with open arms.”

Streeter points out that Meta likes to split AI into two buckets.

“Core AI is building the tools to help engage users and improve ad performance,” she said. “Then there’s the generative AI, the more speculative side of things, which involves new tools like Meta AI, the large language model embedded into Meta’s apps.”

Looking ahead, Hargreaves Lansdown sees Meta as well-placed to drive AI-related growth and continue its dominance in the ad and social networking world.

“The key risk to manage is the investment cycle,” added Streeter. “Meta has gotten ahead of itself in the past, and investors won’t want to see that happen again.”

Some Headwinds to Withstand

Dan Coatsworth, investment analyst at AJ Bell, believes the solid second-quarter results was great news, but also highlighted some potential issues.

He said:

“Despite the positive headline news, there are still some worry spots including rising costs, gigantic AI-related infrastructure spending levels, and ongoing losses for its Reality Labs hardware division,” he said. “On top of that is growing pressure from regulators to stop big tech companies like Meta stifling competition.”

Coatsworth pointed out that a company could virtually guarantee its stock price would rise if it mentioned anything to do with AI. However, that’s not necessarily the case any more.

“The market is now more cautious as investors want to avoid being burned like the dotcom boom and bust when many companies thought all they had to do was build a website and that would guarantee them riches,” he explained.

In his Meta stock outlook, Coatsworth also pointed out that Meta’s significant investment into infrastructure to support AI could get even bigger than previously expected.

“Meta hopes to be crowned king of AI,” he said. “Mark Zuckerberg might have been obsessed with the metaverse for a long time, but cementing the company’s position at the top of the AI tree is now his priority. He is confident Meta AI will become the world’s most-used AI assistant by the end of the year.”

Unmatched Social Media Leadership

Malik Ahmed Khan, equity analyst at Morningstar, increased his fair value META price target from $450 to $560 on September 19, 2024.

In his Meta Platforms stock forecast, he explained the decision was made after “taking a fresh look” at the overall business and a more optimistic outlook on its AI investments.

He wrote:

“We view Meta as the clear leader in social media. The firm’s application lineup, which includes Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger, has close to four billion monthly active users, giving Meta unmatched scale in the space.”

Morningstar forecasts Meta’s sales growing at a 12% compound annual growth rate for the next five years, spearheaded by an increase in average revenue per user growth.

“While we expect advertising sales from North America and Europe to also grow steadily, we believe increasingly affluent and growing middle classes in Asia, Africa, and the Middle East will give Meta an opportunity to improve its ad monetization in those regions.”

META Stock Predictions 2024, 2025 & Beyond: Where Will the Price Go?

The next stage of our Meta stock forecast is looking at the outlook for the META stock price. So, is META a buy, hold, or sell?

The stock is rated as a ‘Moderate Buy,’ according to the views of 41 Wall Street analysts compiled by MarketBeat as of October 3, 2024. However, it’s not unanimous.

While 37 have it down as a ‘Buy,’ there are also two ‘Hold’ recommendations in place and two ‘Sell.’

However, the outlook for Meta stock appears positive.

Here are the latest Meta stock expectations of stock market analysts.

Elsewhere, the Meta stock forecast of TipRanks has the stock as a ‘Strong Buy,’ based on the views it’s collated from 46 Wall Street analysts as of October 3, 2024.

Their consensus view is also more optimistic, with the possibility of a 5.65% upside to a Meta projected stock price of $605.20 over the next 12 months.

The algorithmic Meta stock forecast 2025 of Wallet Investor, has the stock rising 13% to $647.12 over the coming year.

What about a long-term Meta stock forecast?

Although a Meta stock forecast for 2030 is too far into the future, the site’s five-year forecast has the stock hitting $938.79 in October 2029.

Note that analysts and algorithm-based predictions might prove to be wrong.

The Bottom Line: Should I Invest in Meta?

So, what is the conclusion of our long-term Meta stock forecast?

No one can deny that Meta is well placed to help lead the AI charge, and who would bet against Mark Zuckerberg making this happen?

However, it’s worth remembering that this is a new and rapidly developing area that’s likely to require billions of pounds in investment over the coming years.

That is causing a few jitters in the marketplace, and it will require consistent quarters of positive updates to calm the nerves of anxious investors.

All eyes will be on Meta’s third-quarter results announcement at the end of October 2024, as this is likely to set the tone for future movements in the company’s stock price.

FAQs