Meta, formerly Facebook, faces historic drop as stock tanks
New York, Feb 3: Shares in Facebook parent company Meta are in the midst of their worst day ever Thursday after the social media giant reported a rare decline in profit due to a sharp increase in expenses as it invests heavily in its transformation into a virtual reality-based company.
Meta's shares fell more than 23% to 246.76 in early trading Thursday, lopping off more than 215 billion of the company's overall value, known as its market capitalisation. A drop that big would be the largest ever for a company on a single day. Facebook's market cap dropped 120 billion on July 26, 2018.
The Menlo Park, California, based company said Wednesday that profit declined 8% to 10.29 billion in the final three months of 2021. Revenue rose to 20% to 33.67 billion.
The decline could partly be tied to Meta's spending on its Reality Labs segment which includes its virtual reality headsets and augmented reality technology. Meta invested more than 10 billion in the segment in 2021.
In addition, recent privacy changes by Apple make it harder for companies like Meta to track people for advertising purposes, which also puts pressure on the company's revenue.
On a conference call with analysts Wednesday, Meta's chief financial officer said the company faces a 10 billion headwind from Apple's changes in 2022. Analysts at MoffettNathanson, in a note to clients, called the estimate stunning.
Meta also forecast revenue well below analysts' expectations for the current quarter, due in part to growing competition from TikTok, the company said.
Meta Platforms Inc took on its new name last fall to emphasize CEO Mark Zuckerberg's focus on the metaverse. Since then, the company has been shifting resources and hiring engineers including from competitors like Apple and Google who can help realise his vision. It expanded its workforce by 23%, ending the year with 71,970 employees, mostly in technical roles.
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Vinod Tawde seeks apology from Kharge, Rahul through legal notice, warns of defamation lawsuit
Cash-for-vote row
New Delhi, Nov 22: BJP leader Vinod Tawde has demanded an apology from Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and the Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi for making "false and baseless" allegations against him in the cash-for-votes incident in Maharashtra, saying if they don't he would sue them for defamation.
Tawde was accused by Bahujan Vikas Aghadi, a regional party, of distributing Rs 5 crore to woo voters, with its members barging into a hotel room on November 19 in a Mumbai suburb, where the BJP leader was present.
The former Maharashtra minister and BJP national general secretary claimed innocence, saying the alleged amount was not recovered in the probe by the Election Commission and police.
"The Congress only believes in spreading lies, and this incident is a proof of the party's low level politics to dent me and my party's image," Tawde said.
The two Congress leaders and the party spokesperson Supriya Shrinate seized on the row to accuse the BJP of using money power to influence the November 20 assembly polls in the state.
The legal notice sent to the three claimed that they were aware that they were pushing a "totally false story fabricated" by them.
"You all have deliberately, mischievously with the sole intention of damaging the reputation of our client intentionally fabricated the story distribution of money. You all have published false, baseless allegations against our client on various media for tarnishing his image in the eyes of right thinking people in the society," the notice read.
The Congress leaders were in a "great hurry" to damage Tawde's reputation, they did not bother to check the fact and or despite knowing the entire fact they made the false, baseless allegations, it said.
"The entire imputation made by you all are totally false, baseless, malicious and mala fide and as our client is in no way involved in any such illegal activity and as a responsible office bearer of the national political party he is aware of his duties," it added.
The notice demanded an "unconditional apology" to Tawde within 24 hours from the time the receipt of the notice, which was sent on November 21, and published in newspapers and X.
If they do not offer apology, then Tawde will initiate criminal proceedings under Section 356, which covers defamation, of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and also civil proceedings for the damages of Rs 100 crore against the three Congress leaders, the notice said.
