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Revenue up 23%, from $27.7B to $34.1B YoY. Net income is up a whopping 143%, from $4.4B to $11.6B - basically went from a 15% to 34% profit margin (and in line

Revenue up 23%, from $27.7B to $34.1B YoY. Net income is up a whopping 143%, from $4.4B to $11.6B - basically went from a 15% to 34% profit margin (and in line with profit margin numbers from 2021 and prior) No wonder stock is up 4% after earnings.

rvz 3y ago
Exactly. But but but we were told that Meta was collapsing 1 year ago for sure due to their massive spending in VR and AR with the stock falling to less than $90. Its almost as if that full emotion took over the markets over and switched on to complete fear mode and was a complete nothing to see here in the end showing that the so-called death of Meta Platforms Inc was over exaggerated by the media. Another earnings beat and it is business as usual, just like before. [0] [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32256465 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32256465
- ksec 3y ago
  Yes and I remember it keeps being repeated since, dare I say the birth of HN? And every few years someone who were happy and bother to summarise how great Facebook is still doing during their quarterly or yearly results, just to irritate the vast majority of HN who wishes to see its death.
matwood 3y ago
> Net income is up a whopping 143%, from $4.4B to $11.6B Zuck finally got over his bad VR trip. He was spending current FCF on his bad adventure and it was only a matter of time before someone got him to pull back. They can still do a lot in the space without dropping billions/quarter.
- justapassenger 3y ago
  Their VR division is still loosing billions and they guided increased loses as they invest more.
  - andybak 3y ago
    > losing billions Isn't the word "spending" in this case?
- SpaceManNabs 3y ago
  > Zuck finally got over his bad VR trip Whether the trip was bad or not is up to debate, but what makes you think Zuckerberg is quitting on AR/VR? His recent interviews suggest anything but that.
- gardenhedge 3y ago
  What do people want Zuckerberg to do? Not make bets about future tech?
  - rgmerk 3y ago
    Zuck has been throwing tens of billions of dollars at VR and it still hasn't gone mainstream. At what point do you decide that the market just isn't there for the product - or, at least, the market will forever be restricted to fairly serious gamers and sundry small other specialized business applications (eg architectural visualizations)?
    - yCombLinks 3y ago
      It's significantly closer to mainstream since the quest 2 than before. I never saw a VR headset on retail shelves before, and I never heard kids talking about it at all. Now both of those things happen to me occasionally.
      - rgmerk 3y ago
        Perhaps I’m getting old, but back in the day it seemed like that when a consumer product was going to be a hit, “everybody” would want it watts and all because the good parts were so compelling people would put up with the rough edges. I mean, I remember when Wolf3D was first released. Some aspects of it - the low-resolution bitmapped NPCs, for instance - were clearly stopgaps. But the over experience was so amazing you were prepared to ignore that. With virtual reality, the argument seems to be “if we just polish it a bit more it’ll be a compelling consumer product”. How many more years of polishing is it going to take?
        faeriechangling 3y ago
        I feel the hardware is already here, it’s the lack of users and software at this point. I struggle to think of what massive hardware improvement could be needed. I still struggle to see a future where VR/AR headsets don’t have 50m users by the end of the decade. I wouldn’t be shocked to see the Quest3 be a sleeper success once the wave of interest generated by Quest2 materializes in the form of new software.
- HDThoreaun 3y ago
  Reality labs lost more this quarter than last years.
  - gmerc 3y ago
    R&D is not loss. It’s spending or investment. Selling it as loss is investor activism which tends to be motivated by short term thinking and the preference to squeeze whatever you can as a profit since you can always exit your position at any time.
paxys 3y ago
The death of Meta was greatly exaggerated. Wish I had gone in when the stock was taking a beating. They are now up ~250% YoY.
- paulpauper 3y ago
  I recall seeing all those 'Meta is dead' youtube videos last year. Who cares if you're wrong as long as you get that ad $, right. Even if the Metaverse is a dud and a money pit, the rest of the company is firing on all cylinders.
- oldbbsnickname 3y ago
  They're spending $10B/yr on servers alone without any product or plan for their use. It's a waste of money if there isn't a roadmap, which there still isn't. EDIT: I work for Meta as an IC6.
  - nixgeek 3y ago
    You're also disparaging your employer on HN and disclosing things they would likely consider company confidential material. Not a great look, and some risk of becoming "Ex-Meta" if you keep doing this sort of thing and they identify you.
    - mdhb 3y ago
      They can say whatever they like about their employer. I can’t even begin to imagine the mentality of admonishing a stranger on the internet because you think they said something that Facebook doesn’t like. It’s fine I promise.
      - nixgeek 3y ago
        Agree to disagree honestly. If you don't like your employer to the point you're going to trash talk on HN, find a new job, do something else, and certainly don't disclose information like $'s being spent on infrastructure with "no plan to use" (this person is inevitably covered by an NDA, and that is very likely considered company confidential information by Meta). Always best to assume that even if you post attempting to be anonymous and not filling out 'About Me' that one of your 100's of comments on an internet forum may identify you accidentally or intentionally, and that all your comment history may then trace to you.
firebirdn99 3y ago
It was down 4% earlier today from yesterday. Just back to where it was.
- polygamous_bat 3y ago
  Fun fact, down 4% and then up 4% puts you slightly below where you were, since 4% of 100 is larger than 4% of 96.
paulpauper 3y ago
up 4% after a 200% gain over past year...crazy. a year ago ppl were writing the obituaries for Meta, with viral videos on YouTube about Meta's imminent demise getting millions of views...how poorly those have aged. I have never seen as big of a turnround as this...a half a trillion dollar company with as much upside as penny stocks but much smoother, less risk.
ksec 3y ago
This got me interested in what did they spend between the $34B revenue and $11.6B Net income. Cost of revenue 6,210 Research and development 9,241 Marketing and sales 2,877 General and administrative. 2,070 $9B in Research and Development. About $3B of that still belongs to Reality Lab. So even without VR, Facebook still seems to spend relatively a lot of money for their revenue generation. I am surprised by this as I thought their net margin would be quite a bit higher.
- samspenc 3y ago
  Their profit margins were always around 30% or so, except late-2021 through mid-2022 when it fell dramatically due to higher expenses and (unexpected) flat revenue. As for $9B in research and development - they have 66K employees now. Say 30,000 of them are in engineering, costing the company $300K on average (salary + bonus + benefits + other expenses), that's $9B right there in research.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
grecy 3y ago
> Went from a 15% to 34% profit margin > Headcount was 66,185 as of September 30, 2023, a decrease of 24% year-over-year. How to increase profit 101.
almost_usual 3y ago
> No wonder stock is up 4% after earnings. This was short lived.
- smugma 3y ago
  Right; down nearly 8% on the day.

rvz 3y ago

Exactly. But but but we were told that Meta was collapsing 1 year ago for sure due to their massive spending in VR and AR with the stock falling to less than $90. Its almost as if that full emotion took over the markets over and switched on to complete fear mode and was a complete nothing to see here in the end showing that the so-called death of Meta Platforms Inc was over exaggerated by the media. Another earnings beat and it is business as usual, just like before. [0] [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32256465 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32256465

ksec 3y ago
Yes and I remember it keeps being repeated since, dare I say the birth of HN? And every few years someone who were happy and bother to summarise how great Facebook is still doing during their quarterly or yearly results, just to irritate the vast majority of HN who wishes to see its death.

matwood 3y ago

> Net income is up a whopping 143%, from $4.4B to $11.6B Zuck finally got over his bad VR trip. He was spending current FCF on his bad adventure and it was only a matter of time before someone got him to pull back. They can still do a lot in the space without dropping billions/quarter.

justapassenger 3y ago
Their VR division is still loosing billions and they guided increased loses as they invest more.
- andybak 3y ago
  > losing billions Isn't the word "spending" in this case?
SpaceManNabs 3y ago
> Zuck finally got over his bad VR trip Whether the trip was bad or not is up to debate, but what makes you think Zuckerberg is quitting on AR/VR? His recent interviews suggest anything but that.
gardenhedge 3y ago
What do people want Zuckerberg to do? Not make bets about future tech?
- rgmerk 3y ago
  Zuck has been throwing tens of billions of dollars at VR and it still hasn't gone mainstream. At what point do you decide that the market just isn't there for the product - or, at least, the market will forever be restricted to fairly serious gamers and sundry small other specialized business applications (eg architectural visualizations)?
  - yCombLinks 3y ago
    It's significantly closer to mainstream since the quest 2 than before. I never saw a VR headset on retail shelves before, and I never heard kids talking about it at all. Now both of those things happen to me occasionally.
    - rgmerk 3y ago
      Perhaps I’m getting old, but back in the day it seemed like that when a consumer product was going to be a hit, “everybody” would want it watts and all because the good parts were so compelling people would put up with the rough edges. I mean, I remember when Wolf3D was first released. Some aspects of it - the low-resolution bitmapped NPCs, for instance - were clearly stopgaps. But the over experience was so amazing you were prepared to ignore that. With virtual reality, the argument seems to be “if we just polish it a bit more it’ll be a compelling consumer product”. How many more years of polishing is it going to take?
      - faeriechangling 3y ago
        I feel the hardware is already here, it’s the lack of users and software at this point. I struggle to think of what massive hardware improvement could be needed. I still struggle to see a future where VR/AR headsets don’t have 50m users by the end of the decade. I wouldn’t be shocked to see the Quest3 be a sleeper success once the wave of interest generated by Quest2 materializes in the form of new software.
HDThoreaun 3y ago
Reality labs lost more this quarter than last years.
- gmerc 3y ago
  R&D is not loss. It’s spending or investment. Selling it as loss is investor activism which tends to be motivated by short term thinking and the preference to squeeze whatever you can as a profit since you can always exit your position at any time.

paxys 3y ago

The death of Meta was greatly exaggerated. Wish I had gone in when the stock was taking a beating. They are now up ~250% YoY.

paulpauper 3y ago
I recall seeing all those 'Meta is dead' youtube videos last year. Who cares if you're wrong as long as you get that ad $, right. Even if the Metaverse is a dud and a money pit, the rest of the company is firing on all cylinders.
oldbbsnickname 3y ago
They're spending $10B/yr on servers alone without any product or plan for their use. It's a waste of money if there isn't a roadmap, which there still isn't. EDIT: I work for Meta as an IC6.
- nixgeek 3y ago
  You're also disparaging your employer on HN and disclosing things they would likely consider company confidential material. Not a great look, and some risk of becoming "Ex-Meta" if you keep doing this sort of thing and they identify you.
  - mdhb 3y ago
    They can say whatever they like about their employer. I can’t even begin to imagine the mentality of admonishing a stranger on the internet because you think they said something that Facebook doesn’t like. It’s fine I promise.
    - nixgeek 3y ago
      Agree to disagree honestly. If you don't like your employer to the point you're going to trash talk on HN, find a new job, do something else, and certainly don't disclose information like $'s being spent on infrastructure with "no plan to use" (this person is inevitably covered by an NDA, and that is very likely considered company confidential information by Meta). Always best to assume that even if you post attempting to be anonymous and not filling out 'About Me' that one of your 100's of comments on an internet forum may identify you accidentally or intentionally, and that all your comment history may then trace to you.

firebirdn99 3y ago

It was down 4% earlier today from yesterday. Just back to where it was.

polygamous_bat 3y ago
Fun fact, down 4% and then up 4% puts you slightly below where you were, since 4% of 100 is larger than 4% of 96.

paulpauper 3y ago

up 4% after a 200% gain over past year...crazy. a year ago ppl were writing the obituaries for Meta, with viral videos on YouTube about Meta's imminent demise getting millions of views...how poorly those have aged. I have never seen as big of a turnround as this...a half a trillion dollar company with as much upside as penny stocks but much smoother, less risk.

ksec 3y ago

This got me interested in what did they spend between the $34B revenue and $11.6B Net income. Cost of revenue 6,210 Research and development 9,241 Marketing and sales 2,877 General and administrative. 2,070 $9B in Research and Development. About $3B of that still belongs to Reality Lab. So even without VR, Facebook still seems to spend relatively a lot of money for their revenue generation. I am surprised by this as I thought their net margin would be quite a bit higher.

samspenc 3y ago
Their profit margins were always around 30% or so, except late-2021 through mid-2022 when it fell dramatically due to higher expenses and (unexpected) flat revenue. As for $9B in research and development - they have 66K employees now. Say 30,000 of them are in engineering, costing the company $300K on average (salary + bonus + benefits + other expenses), that's $9B right there in research.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

grecy 3y ago

> Went from a 15% to 34% profit margin > Headcount was 66,185 as of September 30, 2023, a decrease of 24% year-over-year. How to increase profit 101.

almost_usual 3y ago

> No wonder stock is up 4% after earnings. This was short lived.

smugma 3y ago
Right; down nearly 8% on the day.