Meta Platforms, Inc. (NASDAQ: META) heads into the final weeks of 2025 as one of the market’s most hotly debated AI stocks. After a turbulent reaction to its massive artificial intelligence spending plans and a one‑off U.S. tax hit, Meta’s share price closed Friday, November 28, 2025 at $647.95, leaving the stock about 19% below its 52‑week high near $796 but still roughly 35% above its 52‑week low around $479. [1]
Today, November 29, fresh headlines are focusing on new institutional filings, commentary from TV personality Jim Cramer, and reports that Meta may channel billions of dollars into Google’s AI chips, intensifying the AI infrastructure arms race and the debate over META’s valuation. [2]
Meta stock price snapshot: where META stands today
- Last close (Nov 28, 2025): $647.95
- One‑week trend: META has climbed from around $613 on November 24 to the high‑$640s, a gain of roughly 6% over the past week. [3]
- 52‑week range: Approximately $479 to $796, putting today’s price about 19% below the high and 35% above the low. [4]
- Market value and valuation: At recent prices, Meta’s market capitalization is around $1.6 trillion, trading at about 28x trailing earnings, according to independent data providers and MarketBeat’s post‑earnings snapshot. [5]
Some valuation models focused on forward earnings see META at closer to 15x forward P/E, highlighting a substantial discount versus other high‑profile AI names like Nvidia and Palantir. [6]
Fresh news on November 29, 2025: what’s moving META now
1. Jim Cramer: “Meta’s been quiet” — but the sell‑off may be overdone
In a piece published overnight, Insider Monkey highlighted Jim Cramer’s latest comments on Meta. Cramer noted META’s recent rally and said the stock jumped about 3% after a Wall Street report suggested the decline was “overdone.” He added that he agrees with that assessment. [7]
While Cramer’s view is just one voice among many, it underscores a growing chorus of market commentators who view Meta’s AI‑driven sell‑off as potentially excessive relative to its earnings strength.
2. Mixed institutional signals: big seller, steady buyers
Today’s 13F‑related headlines show conflicting institutional positioning in META based on second‑quarter holdings:
- Thrivent Financial for Lutherans slashed its Meta stake by 84.5%, selling about 652,800 shares and ending the period with just over 120,000 shares remaining. [8]
- On the other side, Suncoast Equity Management increased its holdings by 1.1% to roughly 46,326 META shares, according to a new MarketBeat note published today. [9]
- Wealthspire Advisors reported boosting its position by 10.8% to around 26,841 shares, while Empowered Funds LLC raised its stake by 18.5% to over 112,000 shares. [10]
These filings describe activity during Q2 2025 rather than trades this week, but they are being reported now and feed into the narrative that some institutions are taking profits while others are buying the dip.
3. Insider selling: small but closely watched
MarketBeat’s recap of Meta’s trading earlier this week also flagged modest insider selling:
- Director Robert M. Kimmitt sold 600 shares at an average price of about $609, leaving him with roughly 7,347 shares.
- Chief Accounting Officer Aaron Anderson sold 726 shares around $592. [11]
In dollar terms, these are small transactions relative to Meta’s size, but insider moves are often scrutinized by traders looking for sentiment clues.
4. Meta’s potential pivot toward Google’s AI chips
Perhaps the most strategically significant storyline around META this weekend is a report that Meta is in talks to spend billions on Google’s custom AI chips (TPUs):
- Reuters reported that Meta is discussing a deal to rent Google’s TPUs via Google Cloud as soon as 2026 and potentially buy chips for its own data centers starting in 2027, with the deal potentially worth billions of dollars. [12]
- Separate coverage from The Times of India and Investing.com emphasizes that Meta is one of Nvidia’s largest customers, with an AI infrastructure budget estimated at up to $72 billion in 2025. Any shift of even a fraction of that spend toward Google TPUs could meaningfully dent Nvidia’s future revenue. [13]
For Meta shareholders, the story is double‑edged:
- It suggests Meta is aggressively seeking cheaper or more flexible AI compute options, which could help control long‑term costs.
- But it also reinforces just how enormous Meta’s AI infrastructure ambitions have become, stoking concerns that capital expenditures could spiral without quick, visible returns.
5. Ongoing narrative: “Analysts split” on META
Yahoo Finance and other outlets are highlighting that analysts are divided on Meta, framing the stock as a tug‑of‑war between rising AI costs and a strong growth outlook:
- Some research notes emphasize record revenue growth, expanding AI‑driven ad tools, and a huge global user base as reasons to stay bullish. [14]
- Others warn that Meta’s $70–72 billion 2025 capital expenditure plan and even higher 2026 expense guidance could pressure margins and free cash flow for years. [15]
Despite these worries, MarketBeat’s latest synthesis still shows a “Moderate Buy” consensus rating with an average target price around $824, and several brokers have lifted targets into the $900s. [16]
Under the hood: Q3 2025 earnings, tax shock, and AI mega‑spend
Record revenue, strong core business
Meta’s Q3 2025 results, released on October 29, showed the underlying business is still extremely healthy:
- Total revenue:$51.24 billion, up about 26% year‑over‑year, beating Wall Street expectations. [17]
- Family of Apps (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger, Threads): About $50.8 billion in revenue, also up roughly 26%. [18]
- Click‑to‑WhatsApp ad revenue grew around 60% year‑over‑year, while more advertisers adopted AI‑assisted tools like Advantage+ creative and Meta’s generative ad features, according to the Q3 earnings call transcript. [19]
Free cash flow remained robust as well: Meta generated roughly $30 billion in operating cash in Q3, with free cash flow just over $10.6 billion after heavy capital expenditures. [20]
One‑time $15.9B tax charge from the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act”
Despite the strong top line, GAAP earnings collapsed in Q3 because of U.S. tax reforms:
- Meta recorded a one‑time, non‑cash income tax charge of $15.93 billion related to the “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” (OBBBA) enacted in mid‑2025. [21]
- As a result, Meta’s reported net income for the quarter was only about $2.71 billion, and diluted EPS came in at $1.05. [22]
- Management disclosed that excluding this one‑time tax charge, Q3 2025 net income would have been $18.64 billion, with EPS around $7.25 — a level that actually beat analyst expectations. [23]
This distinction between GAAP EPS (1.05) and underlying / adjusted EPS (≈7.25) is central to today’s valuation debate: some investors focus on the compressed GAAP figure and headline volatility, while others argue that the tax charge is a non‑recurring accounting event that obscures Meta’s true earning power.
The $70–72 billion AI infrastructure bet
The other dominant theme from Q3 is Meta’s staggering AI spending plan:
- Meta raised its 2025 capital expenditure outlook to $70–72 billion, up from a prior range of $66–72 billion, largely to expand AI data centers and GPU clusters. [24]
- Third‑quarter capex alone was about $19.4 billion, pushing year‑to‑date spending beyond $48 billion. [25]
- Several analyses and news outlets now estimate Meta’s full‑year 2025 AI infrastructure budget in the $64–72 billion range, putting it in the same league as, or ahead of, Amazon, Microsoft, and Google in raw infrastructure outlays. [26]
Meta has also signaled that 2026 expenses could be even higher, with some reports suggesting total expenses might approach $97 billion as the company doubles down on compute capacity and AI talent. [27]
This scale of investment has prompted commentators to warn that AI may be approaching a “metaverse moment”—a reference to Meta’s costly VR push—where spending runs far ahead of clear returns. [28]
Reality Labs: big losses, strategic optionality
Meta’s AR/VR and hardware arm, Reality Labs, remains a major drag on profits:
- Q3 2025 Reality Labs revenue was about $470 million, up roughly 74% year‑on‑year thanks to strong demand for the new Quest 3S and AI‑infused smart glasses. [29]
- However, the segment recorded an operating loss of about $4.4 billion in Q3, with some estimates placing its cumulative losses above $70 billion since inception. [30]
Management argues that Reality Labs now plays a strategic role in Meta’s AI roadmap: devices like AI glasses act as rich sensors feeding audio‑visual data into multimodal AI models. [31]
Still, for many investors, RL’s ongoing multi‑billion‑dollar losses are a reminder of Meta’s willingness to pursue expensive long‑term bets, and they heighten skepticism about whether the AI capex surge will pay off more quickly than the metaverse spend did.
Legal & regulatory backdrop: FTC defeat eases breakup risk
On the regulatory front, Meta scored a major court victory in mid‑November:
- A U.S. district judge dismissed the Federal Trade Commission’s antitrust case that sought to force Meta to divest Instagram and WhatsApp, ruling that the agency failed to prove Meta currently holds an illegal social‑media monopoly. [32]
Financial press and policy analysts broadly view this as a significant reduction in breakup risk that had hung over the stock for years, even as broader AI and privacy regulation continues to evolve in the U.S. and Europe. [33]
Income profile: dividend, cash flow, and balance sheet
Meta has quietly evolved into a cash‑returning mega‑cap:
- In September, the board declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.525 per share, paid on September 29 to holders of record on September 22. [34]
- At current prices, that implies a yield around 0.3%, a small but symbolic payout for a company that still generates substantial surplus cash even amid heavy AI spending. [35]
- Meta also continues aggressive share repurchases, helping offset dilution and magnifying EPS growth when underlying profits rise. (Recent buyback figures are embedded in the company’s Q3 financial tables and commentary.) [36]
The combination of a fortress balance sheet, strong free cash flow, and a new dividend gives Meta more flexibility than many high‑growth peers to fund an AI “supercycle” while still returning cash to shareholders.
Why opinions on META are so divided
Bullish thesis highlights
Supporters of Meta stock emphasize several points:
- Dominant advertising engine: With more than 3.5 billion daily active people across its “Family of Apps,” Meta still commands unmatched reach for advertisers, and Q3 ad revenue grew about 26% year‑over‑year. [37]
- AI already boosting results: AI recommendation systems and automated ad tools are driving higher engagement and reportedly tens of billions in annualized ad spend routed through Meta’s AI‑optimized systems. [38]
- Valuation discount vs AI peers: AInvest and other commentators argue that, at roughly 15x forward earnings, META looks cheap relative to other AI leaders that trade at far richer multiples while generating less cash. [39]
- Antitrust overhang reduced: The FTC defeat makes a forced breakup of Instagram and WhatsApp far less likely in the near term, reinforcing the durability of Meta’s social graph. [40]
Bearish concerns
Skeptics focus on the following risks:
- Runaway capital expenditures: With capex set at $70–72 billion this year and likely higher in 2026, critics worry that Meta could repeat its metaverse mistake—spending far ahead of monetization. [41]
- Reality Labs drag: A Q3 loss of $4.4 billion on just $470 million in revenue—and over $70 billion in cumulative losses—shows how long some of Meta’s bets may take to pay off. [42]
- Regulatory + youth‑safety risk: Even with the FTC case dismissed, Meta faces ongoing legal scrutiny over youth safety, data practices, and AI, particularly in the U.S. and EU, which could lead to fines or new compliance costs. [43]
- Competitive intensity: TikTok, YouTube, Snap and emerging AI‑native platforms continue to vie for user attention and ad dollars, limiting Meta’s ability to raise ad prices unchecked. [44]
Key numbers META investors are watching
For readers tracking Meta stock via Google News or Discover, here are the headline metrics to keep in mind as of November 29, 2025:
- Share price: $647.95 (Nov 28 close) [45]
- 52‑week range: ~$479 – $796 [46]
- Market cap: ≈ $1.6 trillion [47]
- Trailing P/E: ~28x; forward P/E estimates around mid‑teens depending on the source [48]
- 2025 capex guidance: $70–72 billion; 2026 expenses expected to be “significantly higher” [49]
- Q4 2025 revenue guidance: $56–59 billion [50]
- Reality Labs Q3 loss: ~$4.4 billion on $470 million of revenue [51]
- Quarterly dividend: $0.525 per share [52]
What to watch next for Meta stock
Looking beyond today’s headlines, here’s what could shape META’s next leg higher—or lower:
- Q4 2025 results & 2026 guidance
Investors will look for updated commentary on AI monetization, capital intensity, and whether Meta begins to bend the cost curve after this infrastructure surge. [53] - Clarity on AI chip strategy (Nvidia vs Google vs in‑house)
Any confirmed shift of billions of dollars from Nvidia GPUs to Google TPUs—or greater reliance on Meta’s own MTIA chips—could change the economics of its AI push and its relationships with key partners. [54] - Evidence of AI ROI in advertising and Business AI
Metrics like ad revenue growth, click‑to‑message performance, and adoption of Meta’s AI assistant across apps and smart glasses will be critical to justifying the current AI spending trajectory. [55] - Regulatory developments
New AI, privacy, or youth‑safety rules in the U.S. or EU could affect Meta’s product roadmap and profitability, even after its win against the FTC’s breakup attempt. [56] - Investor sentiment around AI capex
With growing media discussion of an AI “capex bubble,” Meta will be under pressure to prove that its AI infrastructure spree delivers tangible, measurable returns rather than becoming “Metaverse 2.0.” [57]
Bottom line
As of November 29, 2025, Meta Platforms stock sits at the crossroads of enormous opportunity and equally large skepticism. The company is:
- Generating record revenue and strong underlying profits,
- Investing more heavily in AI infrastructure than almost any rival, and
- Facing intense scrutiny over whether that spending will pay back quickly enough to satisfy shareholders already scarred by the metaverse era.
For long‑term‑focused investors, Meta represents a high‑beta, high‑cash‑flow AI platform whose valuation looks modest relative to many peers—but whose execution on AI monetization, cost control, and regulation will need to be nearly flawless.
Important note: This article is for informational and news purposes only and does not constitute financial advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. Always do your own research and consider speaking with a qualified financial advisor before making investment decisions.
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