Oppenheimer Downgrades Meta to Perform

Oppenheimer analyst Jason Helfstein downgraded Meta Platforms Inc. (NASDAQ: META) from Outperform to Perform.

“Downgrading META to Perform (from Outperform) as risk/reward properly reflected after-hours.

Significant investment in Superintelligence despite unknown revenue opportunity mirrors 2021/2022 Metaverse spending.

Implied 4Q opex/capex both 7% ahead of Street and guiding FY26 capex dollar growth ‘notably larger than 2025’ and expenses ‘significantly faster’ than 2025’s +23%, both ahead of Street.

While 3Q ex-FX advertising +25% vs. 2Q’s +21% & 4% above Opco/Street, no rationale for guidance of 600bps deceleration in 4Q.

Moreover, we believe investors will struggle to rationalize the PE until there is visibility into 2027, as aggressive revenue growth offset by high spending.

This compares to GOOG with predictable earnings at a reasonable PE.

Meanwhile, both companies trading at same PE (21x 2027E) and Search could outgrow META at some point in 2026.”

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