22 October 2026
If you are covering Meta's latest financial results, please find below a comment from Ben Barringer, head of technology research at Quilter Cheviot:
"Meta delivered a solid earnings update with revenues up 26% and guidance edged upwards to a similar amount for Q4 growth. Headcount was down 12% following its latest rounds of restructuring, while capital expenditure has been increased marginally at the bottom end of the guidance. All positive moves from the company as it embarks on its next phase of growth.
"The launch of Muse, Meta's AI model, aims to fuel that next growth development and early signs look promising. Meta says it has 10m users of the model with much of the activity focused on shopping and travel, with an average spend through the model being around $200. Meta wants to scale this to one billion users globally and get to profitability quicker than the company would usually do, underscoring their confidence in Muse and its capabilities. The company will need more compute which Meta is still working through, while it aims to have a free model for light users of Muse and a subscription one for more premium features and for enterprises.
"The other big talk of the town is the new share class being launched, a non-voting one. There are two reasons for this share split - firstly, it will help Mark Zuckerberg retain control of the voting shares while a large tax bill looms in California. And secondly, Meta may be looking to raise new equity to help power some of their investments into AI. It mirrors what Google has done too as the hyperscalers look for various streams of investment to help fund their capex plans.
"All in all, though, Meta's core business remains strong, and with Muse being scaled up at pace, you can see a solid runway for future growth too."
