He is playing a dangerous game of appearances with stock buybacks to fool investors, is all a show - the fundamentals did not change that much

You obviously didn't read the article, did you?

This is a company that has consistently lied about everything it can. I'm thinking things like ads views, engagement etc. Basically things that no one outside the company can disprove.

Now, the article says that the stock jumped on lower projected costs. Hmm I wonder if this company will lie about projected costs, which is something no one outside the company can disprove.

So yeah, I did read the article, and I agree the fundamentals didn't change much.

Stock buybacks are about as tame as it gets. Where's the deception? Where's the danger?

Reference: https://www.cnbc.com/2023/02/01/facebook-parent-meta-announc...

Just shows how irrational and jumpy the stock market is. It’s the same company and the fundamentals haven’t really changed, but some people sold the stocks for 40-50% less just a few months ago. Now they are buying it back.

I don't know if I would call it irrational. People sold the stock because there was a fear Zuckerberg was going to run the company into the ground by ignoring their fundamentals and focusing on VR. Now we've seen their fundamental services coming back up and they've streamlined the business by firing a lot of extraneous employees. Seems rational, although I agree with calling it jumpy

Behavioral finance explains a lot of irrational investor decisions through fear. A lot of risk aversity comes from fear, but also some risk taking (out of FOMO, for example).

In specific BF terms, the gap between a rational decision and one driven by strong emotions is called the "emotional gap". Sometimes the term is also used when referring to a gap between a fundamental market value of a security or commodity and the observed market value.

Seems like the analysts think Meta isnt a dirty brand to be avoided at all costs.

Personally, I see an abusive relationship getting worse and worse. The customers run, the business cuts expenses, the customers are now subject to more automation and anti-humanness, Meta enters a deathstruggle for control of VR/AR with Apple and loses. Facebook is already irrelevant, and getting more so by the day.

At least Apple makes their money mostly on hardware and software, not ads. Systemically, this beats Meta every time, in a fair fight.

I want to see the single day drop in Meta stock when Apple unveils its AR/VR platform and hardware.

> Facebook is already irrelevant, and getting more so by the day.

A quarter of the Earth’s population in daily active users is certainly a take on “irrelevant”.

The same could have been said about yahoo at one point, or cable TV, or landlines

Yahoo never had 25% of the worlds population. When CableTV and landlines were used by 25% of the global population they were far from irrelevant. Yes they fade eventually but there's nothing on the horizon to replace the web right now.