Mark Zuckerberg, the co-founder of Facebook and one of its major shareholders, saw his fortune plummet by nearly $30 billion in a day following a record drop in shares of parent company Meta on Thursday.
With a current fortune of $84.3 billion, according to Forbes, this is the first time the 37-year-old has not been included in the 10 richest people on the planet since the summer of 2015.
Zuckerberg currently owns almost 13% of Meta Platforms, Facebook’s parent company.
The $29.8 billion loss of Zuckerberg’s fortune is the second-largest daily loss in history, as it is second to the more than $35 billion lost by the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, last November after he wrote on Twitter that he intended to sell 10% of his stake in Tesla.
Meta shares fell after the company warned of weaker-than-expected revenue growth next quarter and said recent privacy changes by Apple would cost the company $10 billion, according to CNBC.
The 26% drop was Meta’s biggest one-day plunge and resulted in the loss of more than $200 billion in company capitalisation. This amount is also a negative historical record.
What has been happening in the company lately?
1) Facebook announced on Wednesday that its profits fell by 8%, ie 10.29 billion dollars in the last quarter of 2021. The oxymoron, in this case, is found in the following element: The same announcement states that revenues increased by 20%, ie by 33.67 billion dollars.
2) How is it possible to increase revenue but decrease profits? According to analysts, this … incompatibility is due to the costs for the Reality Labs department, ie the department that will “launch” the future of the online world, virtual reality. According to reports, Meta has already invested more than $10 billion in this technology and is expected to spend even more funds.
3) Recent privacy changes by Apple make it more difficult for companies like Meta to track people for advertising purposes, which also puts pressure on the company’s revenue. In a teleconference with analysts on Wednesday, Meta’s chief financial officer said the company was facing $10 billion in “deferred consequences” from Apple changes in 2022. Analysts at MoffettNathanson, in a note to customers, described the estimate as “surprising.”
4) Meta forecast revenue is much lower than analysts’ expectations for the current quarter, partly due to growing competition from TikTok, the company said, clearly influencing investors.
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