Meta Platforms saw a significant drop in shares yesterday, leading to a sharp decrease in the assets of the company’s owner and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg. The session on April 25 ended with Meta Platforms shares falling by 11%, resulting in Zuckerberg’s assets dropping by $18 billion. This marked the 11th largest daily decrease recorded by Bloomberg Billionaires Index among the world’s billionaires.
Zuckerberg’s wealth is primarily tied to Meta shares, with his current holdings valued at $157 billion. As a result of the share decline, Zuckerberg slipped to the position of the 4th richest person globally, making way for Tesla CEO Elon Musk. Musk, on the other hand, saw an increase in his assets by $5.8 billion due to the rise in Tesla shares, bringing his total net worth to $184 billion.
The slump in Meta shares was triggered by the company’s announcement that second-quarter revenue might be lower than analysts’ expectations. Meta also raised its forecast for investments in new AI products and artificial intelligence support infrastructure to $96-99 billion for the year, with potential further increases next year. Zuckerberg has emphasized the importance of artificial intelligence for the company, especially following the global hype surrounding OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot launch in 2022.
Despite investor concerns about Meta’s AI strategy taking time to yield results, the actual share decrease was below the 15% level seen in the April 24 after-hours trading session. Since the beginning of the year, Meta’s stock has risen by 25% and has recently approached its historical peak, driven by investor excitement around AI technology. Facebook’s current market capitalization stands at around $1,120 billion.