Meta's AI bet could deliver another earnings surprise, analyst says
Meta Platforms Inc. META could deliver stronger-than-expected third-quarter revenue as artificial intelligence improves its ...
Analysis updated on Oct. 16, 2026 (UTC) · Total · absolute moveSwitch to Alpha · Nasdaq
On Oct. 16, 2026, META is rated Neutral: its 90-day Total forecast sits in the middle 30% of the 5184 stocks scored that day.
Meta Platforms, Inc. is a mega-cap company with a market capitalization of $1.81T. It ranks number 3 by market capitalization among the 60 Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc. issuers in our coverage with a current forecast.
For META, the Spearman rank correlation between our 90-day forecasts and the returns that followed is 55.0%, measured on 357 forecast dates between 2022-07-29 and 2026-07-17 on this stock's own recent history. A rank correlation runs from -100% to +100%: it measures whether higher forecasts were followed by higher returns, and a value near zero or below means the model has shown little skill on this stock. On the 30-day forecasts the same correlation is 54.0%, measured on 400 forecast dates between 2022-07-29 and 2026-09-16. Across our coverage, the out-of-sample test on 4495 stocks from 2025-01-06 to 2026-07-07 produced a positive net return in 82.5% of rebalance periods (factor-neutral book, net of estimated costs). Full backtest report
Expected absolute price move over the horizon, market included. This is the number a price target is built from. Ratings: strong buy ≥ +5.1%, buy ≥ +3.4%, sell < +1.8%, strong sell < +0.8% (top 15%, next 20%, middle 30%, next 20%, bottom 15% of the 2026-10-16 signals)
A free account shows the exact forecast, rating and rank of 3 tickers you follow, META included.
Follow META free90D Total forecasts of every company scored, cut into five relative ratings at the 15th, 35th, 65th and 85th percentiles (dashed lines).
Trailing twelve months. The industry median and the rank (1 = highest) are taken over the Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc. peers listed below that report each metric.
| Metric | META | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Market Cap | $1.81T | 3/60 |
| P/E Ratio | 26.73x | 9/22 |
| P/B Ratio | 6.92x | 8/41 |
| Dividend Yield | 0.30% | 4/6 |
| EPS | $26.54 | – |
| Book Value/Share | $102.54 | – |
| Revenue/Share | $89.60 | – |
| FCF/Share | $16.08 | – |
| Metric | META | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| ROE | 26.1% | 6/32 |
| ROA | 15.1% | 8/38 |
| ROIC | 22.1% | 6/41 |
| Gross Margin | 81.8% | 9/45 |
| Operating Margin | 38.1% | 2/45 |
| Net Margin | 29.8% | 4/39 |
| EBT Margin | 38.4% | 4/47 |
| Tax Rate | 22.2% | – |
| Metric | META | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Current Ratio | 2.23x | 19/53 |
| D/E Ratio | 0.72x | 25/46 |
| Financial Leverage | 1.72x | 23/44 |
| Interest Coverage | 40.0x | 6/49 |
| Working Capital | $69.10B | 3/52 |
| Metric | META | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Operating Cash Flow | $130.30B | 2/49 |
| Free Cash Flow | $40.98B | 2/37 |
| Capital Spending | -$89.33B | 36/37 |
| OCF Growth YoY | 27.4% | 12/31 |
| FCF Growth YoY | -18.3% | 20/25 |
| FCF/Sales | 17.9% | 15/38 |
| CapEx/Sales | 39.1% | 2/38 |
| Metric | META | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Asset Turnover | 0.51x | 27/38 |
| Receivables Turnover | 10.5x | 10/40 |
| Fixed Assets Turnover | 1.0x | 38/40 |
| Days Sales Outstanding | 35 days | 31/40 |
| Payables Period | 139 days | 8/34 |
| Metric | META | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Total Revenue | $228.25B | 2/42 |
| Operating Income | $86.93B | 2/47 |
| Net Income | $68.10B | 2/38 |
| R&D Expense | $71.64B | 1/37 |
| SG&A Expense | $62.54B | 2/41 |
| Cost of Goods Sold | $41.66B | 2/44 |
| Metric | META | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| Dividends Per Share | $2.11 | – |
| Payout Ratio | 8.0% | 4/5 |
| Shares Outstanding | 2548M | – |
| Net Income Growth | -4.8% | 12/12 |
| EPS Growth | -3.7% | 13/18 |
| Total Current Assets | $125.47B | 27.9% of assets |
| Cash & Short-term Investments | $15.46B | 3.4% of assets |
| Accounts Receivable | $21.75B | 4.8% of assets |
| Total Liabilities | $188.74B | 41.9% of assets |
| Short-term Debt | $40.49B | 9.0% of assets |
Companies classified under the same SEC industry code as Meta Platforms, Inc. (Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc.): 60 common-stock issuers with a forecast this week, one row per issuer, largest first. This is a classification match, not a curated list of competitors.
Reveal all forecasts · See exact % predictions for all competitors
Sign up free| Company | 90-Day AI Forecast (Total) | Market Cap |
|---|---|---|
| META Meta Platforms, Inc. | ▶ | $1.81T |
| GOOG Alphabet Inc. | ▶ | $4.12T |
| SPCX Space Exploration Technologies Corp | ▶ | $1.92T |
| APP Applovin Corp | ▶ | $89.06B |
| NBIS Nebius Group N.V. | ▲ | $41.87B |
| ZM Zoom Communications, Inc. | ▶ | $27.48B |
| FLUT Flutter Entertainment Plc | ▲ | $13.12B |
| PINS Pinterest, Inc. | ▲ | $12.41B |
| TEM Tempus Ai, Inc. | ▲ | $11.68B |
| DOCN Digitalocean Holdings, Inc. | ▲ | $11.60B |
| FDS Factset Research Systems Inc | ▼ | $10.73B |
| SNAP Snap Inc | ▲ | $10.37B |
| MTCH Match Group, Inc. | ▶ | $9.86B |
| BZ Kanzhun Ltd | ▼ | $7.51B |
| TTD Trade Desk, Inc. | ▲ | $5.75B |
| GDS Gds Holdings Ltd | ▲ | $4.57B |
| SRAD Sportradar Group Ag | ▶ | $3.56B |
| MGNI Magnite, Inc. | ▶ | $3.35B |
| WIX Wix.Com Ltd. | ▶ | $3.23B |
| PPLI People Inc | ▼ | $2.89B |
| CSQR Csquare, Inc. | ▶ | $2.68B |
| GRND Grindr Inc. | ▲ | $2.45B |
| RUM Rum Group Inc. | ▲ | $2.28B |
| DV Doubleverify Holdings, Inc. | ▼ | $2.09B |
| DJT Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. | ▶ | $1.94B |
| WB Weibo Corp | ▼ | $1.59B |
| TRIP Tripadvisor, Inc. | ▶ | $1.09B |
| VNET Vnet Group, Inc. | ▲ | $1.06B |
| HSTM Healthstream Inc | ▼ | $969M |
| NXDR Nextdoor Holdings, Inc. | ▲ | $952M |
| TBLA Taboola.Com Ltd. | ▲ | $929M |
| BMBL Bumble Inc. | ▲ | $910M |
| SIFY Sify Technologies Ltd | ▶ | $828M |
| DSP Viant Technology Inc. | ▲ | $789M |
| CEVA Ceva Inc | ▲ | $774M |
| EVER Everquote, Inc. | ▶ | $768M |
| PUBM Pubmatic, Inc. | ▲ | $758M |
| RZLV Rezolve Ai Plc | ▶ | $730M |
| SMWB Similarweb Ltd. | ▲ | $726M |
| RXT Rackspace Technology, Inc. | ▲ | $720M |
| SABR Sabre Corp | ▲ | $678M |
| NEXN Nexxen International Ltd. | ▶ | $499M |
| ZIP Ziprecruiter, Inc. | ▲ | $363M |
| BLND Blend Labs, Inc. | ▲ | $213M |
| SANG Sangoma Technologies Corp | ▲ | $159M |
| HCAT Health Catalyst, Inc. | ▶ | $130M |
| GOAI Eva Live Inc | ▲ | $61M |
| JG Aurora Mobile Ltd | ▶ | $53M |
| PODC Podcastone, Inc. | ▲ | $53M |
| SOGP Sound Group Inc. | ▶ | $44M |
| RMXI Rmx Industries, Inc. | ▼ | $42M |
| TEAD Teads Holding Co. | ▲ | $39M |
| HOLO Microcloud Hologram Inc. | ▶ | $27M |
| IPM Intelligent Protection Management Corp. | ▶ | $23M |
| SST System1, Inc. | ▼ | $18M |
| TRSO Transuite.Org Inc. | ▼ | $14M |
| CDLX Cardlytics, Inc. | ▲ | $12M |
| GITS Global Interactive Technologies, Inc. | ▶ | $6M |
| TWAV Taoweave, Inc. | ▲ | $5M |
| CNET Zw Data Action Technologies Inc. | ▶ | $5M |
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On Oct. 16, 2026, META is rated Neutral: its 90-day Total forecast sits in the middle 30% of the 5184 stocks scored that day.
For META, the Spearman rank correlation between our 90-day forecasts and the returns that followed is 55.0%, measured on 357 forecast dates between 2022-07-29 and 2026-07-17 on this stock's own recent history. A rank correlation runs from -100% to +100%: it measures whether higher forecasts were followed by higher returns, and a value near zero or below means the model has shown little skill on this stock. On the 30-day forecasts the same correlation is 54.0%, measured on 400 forecast dates between 2022-07-29 and 2026-09-16. Across our coverage, the out-of-sample test on 4495 stocks from 2025-01-06 to 2026-07-07 produced a positive net return in 82.5% of rebalance periods (factor-neutral book, net of estimated costs). Full backtest report
Meta Platforms, Inc. forecasts are refreshed on trading days as the daily model run completes. The forecast on this page was produced on Oct. 16, 2026.
60 issuers in our coverage, META included, share the SEC industry code Services-Computer Programming, Data Processing, Etc.. The largest are: Alphabet Inc. (GOOG), Space Exploration Technologies Corp (SPCX), Applovin Corp (APP), Nebius Group N.V. (NBIS), Zoom Communications, Inc. (ZM), Flutter Entertainment Plc (FLUT).
This analysis is generated automatically using our proprietary AI systems and should not be considered personalized investment advice. Past performance does not guarantee future results. Always conduct your own research and consider consulting a financial advisor before making investment decisions.
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