Zuckerberg plans to allocate an additional $10 billion for AI this year beyond initial expectations. Despite millions of users leaving its platforms, Meta is increasing AI investments. In a recent earnings call, Meta revealed that “Family daily active people,” encompassing users of Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, or Messenger, decreased by 20 million this quarter compared to the last three months. Meta cites “internet disruptions in Iran and a restriction on WhatsApp in Russia” as reasons for this decline. By consolidating user stats across platforms, it’s unclear which ones are most affected. If wanting to hide significant social platform user loss, this tactic would be effective.
Meta’s projected capital expenditures for 2026 have risen to $125-145 billion, $10 billion more than previous estimates, attributed to higher component pricing and, secondarily, costs for future data center capacity. CFO Susan Li noted this correction was necessary because Meta previously “underestimated our compute demand.”
Meta’s revenue saw its fastest growth since 2021, increasing 33 percent from $42.3 billion last year to $56.3 billion this quarter. However, Reality Labs, focused on wearables and virtual reality, reported a $4.03 billion loss for the quarter, following two rounds of layoffs since January.
Meta’s stock price dropped over 7 percent since the earnings release announcement.