Meta Revenue Hits Record High, But AI Costs Drag Down Stock Price by Nearly 7%

BlockBeats News, July 30th, Meta Platforms (META.O) reported a record high revenue in the second quarter, but the company's update on AI spending plans has raised investor concerns about its infrastructure construction costs.

Meta slightly increased the lower end of its annual capital expenditure guidance from $125 billion to $130 billion, while keeping the upper end unchanged at $145 billion. Its second-quarter revenue was $60.8 billion, a 28% year-over-year increase, but the net profit was $15.8 billion, below analyst expectations.

As a result, Meta's stock price fell over 6.8% after hours. To catch up in the AI race, Meta has already invested tens of billions of dollars in chip procurement, data center construction, and top talent recruitment. More recently, it partnered with BlackRock to finance at least $12 billion to build a data center in Texas. Meta's free cash flow in the second quarter was $7.84 billion.