Meta Surpasses Q2 Estimates, Shares Surge on Rosy Q3 Forecast

Meta (META), the parent company of Facebook, reported stronger-than-expected second-quarter earnings on Wednesday, alongside an optimistic revenue outlook for Q3. The company projected third-quarter revenue between $47.5 billion and $50.5 billion—exceeding Wall Street’s $46.2 billion estimate.

The announcement sent Meta’s stock soaring over 8% in after-hours trading.

Q2 Highlights:

• EPS: $7.14 (vs. $5.89 expected)

• Revenue: $47.5 billion (vs. $44.83 billion expected)

• Advertising revenue: $46.5 billion (vs. $44.07 billion expected)

• Reality Labs loss: $4.5 billion (vs. $4.8 billion expected)

The results mark significant growth compared to Q2 2023, when Meta reported EPS of $5.16 and revenue of $39.07 billion.

AI Expansion Fuels Spending Surge
The earnings report follows Meta’s aggressive investments in AI talent and infrastructure. Recently, CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the hiring of former OpenAI researcher Shengjia Zhao as founder and chief scientist of Meta’s Superintelligence Lab.

Meta has also recruited top AI leaders, including:

• Alexandr Wang, Scale AI CEO (following a $14.3 billion investment)

• Nat Friedman, former GitHub CEO

• Daniel Gross, Safe Superintelligence CEO

• Ruoming Pang, Apple’s ex-head of AI foundation models

Additionally, the company is investing hundreds of billions in multi-gigawatt data centers, such as its Hyperion facility, designed to eventually support 5 gigawatts of computing capacity.

CFO Susan Li noted that infrastructure and talent acquisition will drive rising costs in 2026:

"The largest growth driver will be infrastructure, including depreciation and operating costs. Employee compensation will also increase as we onboard technical talent and account for full-year expenses from 2025 hires."

Meta’s stock closed at $695.21 (-0.68%) but surged to $776.00 (+11.61%) in after-hours trading.