Meta Platforms (META) has reported first-quarter financial results that beat Wall Street expectations on both the top and bottom lines.
The Silicon Valley-based company has announced earnings per share (EPS) of $6.43 U.S., which was ahead of the $5.28 U.S. expected among analysts.
Revenue of $42.31 billion U.S. beat the $41.40 billion U.S. that was forecast on Wall Street.
The company’s sales rose 16% from a year earlier.
Meta Platforms also largely maintained its forward guidance.
Management said they expect second-quarter sales of $42.50 billion U.S. to $45.50 billion U.S., which is in line with analysts’ expectations of $44.03 billion U.S.
However, executives at Meta warned that they have begun to see some reduced online advertising spending in Asia, which they attributed to America’s ongoing global trade war.
Meta also lowered the range of its 2025 expenses, which will now come in between $113 billion U.S. and $118 billion U.S. That figure stood at $114 billion U.S. to $119 billion U.S. previously.
Still, Meta raised its 2025 capital expenditures to a range of $64 billion U.S. to $72 billion U.S., up from a prior outlook of $60 billion U.S. to $65 billion U.S.
During the year’s first quarter, the company’s advertising revenue came in at $41.39 billion U.S., ahead of Wall Street projections that called for $40.44 billion U.S.
Meta’s Reality Labs hardware division posted an operating loss of $4.20 billion U.S. in Q1, which was less than the $4.60 billion U.S. that Wall Street was expecting.
Daily active users on Meta’s social media platforms that include Facebook and Instagram rose to 3.43 billion in the quarter, topping analyst estimates of 3.39 billion.
The company’s Threads microblogging service that is based on rival X/Twitter now has 350 million monthly users, said Meta executives. That’s up from 320 million in January of this year.
The Meta artificial intelligence (A.I.) digital assistant now has nearly one billion monthly users. In January, the company said the A.I. service had 700 million monthly users.
The stock of Meta Platforms is up 6% in premarket trading after the company’s Q1 earnings print. Before today (May 1), the stock had declined 8% this year to trade at $549 U.S. a share.