Facebook: In December, a quarter of the world’s population visited the website everyday
In December, there were 2 billion daily users on Facebook, or nearly a quarter of the world’s population.
The business, which has been under stress as its expenses increase and advertising sales decline, helped fuel new optimism about the business with the larger-than-expected gain.
As CEO Mark Zuckerberg proclaimed 2023 the “year of productivity,” shares in Meta’s parent company increased by more than 15% in after-hours trading.
On cost savings, he claimed to be concentrating. He referred to the company’s sales, which fell in 2022 after years of double-digit growth. “We’re in a different atmosphere now. We don’t expect it to continue, but I also don’t think it will return to how it was before.”
Last year, Meta, which also operates Instagram and WhatsApp, announced a significant reorganisation that included downsizing its office space and eliminating 11,000 positions, or around 13% of its workforce.
The company stated that those actions cost it $4.6 billion last year, which negatively impacted its profitability, which was nearly cut in half. It nevertheless generated a $23.2 billion profit for the year.
The company reported $32.2bn in revenue for the three months that ended in December, a 4% year-over-year decline. However, it turned out better than many experts had predicted.
When Meta reported the first-ever loss in daily Facebook users in its history and made it clear it was concentrating efforts on virtual reality, often referred to as the metaverse, it frightened shareholders last year.
However, in December, there were 4% more daily users on the site than there had been a year earlier, including people from Europe, the United States, and Canada.
According to Meta, the daily active user count across all of its apps increased 5% from the previous year.
Reels is the industry’s video product, on which it has been concentrating as it competes with competitors like TikTok, which have grown in popularity, particularly among younger users, according to Mr. Zuckerberg.
He said those efforts were beginning to pay off as advertisers began to direct their budgets toward the videos.
Shares increased as a result of investors seizing on the company’s estimate of reduced expenses and bigger sales than anticipated in the next few months.
The business also announced that it would invest an additional $40 billion to repurchase shares, which fell precipitously last year as a result of investor scepticism about the company’s future.
