Meta revenue jumps 26%, but teen settlement dents profit

Meta Platforms said its third-quarter revenue rose 26% from a year earlier to $64.6 billion, higher than Wall Street expected. The company also gave a stronger fourth-quarter forecast, though a legal settlement cut into profit. Meta's earnings release put revenue for the quarter ended September 30 at $64.60 billion, up from $51.24 billion. Analysts surveyed by LSEG had expected $63.37 billion, CNBC reported.deadline.com+1

Meta expects fourth-quarter revenue of $73 billion to $76 billion. The midpoint of that range is above the analyst estimate of $73.73 billion, according to CNBC. Shares rose more than 4% at one point in after-hours trading, TradingKey reported.stocktitan.net+1

Legal charge weighs on profit

Total costs and expenses rose 68% to $51.61 billion. That figure includes a $9.89 billion charge tied to an August agreement with 52 state attorneys general. The agreement settles litigation over teen mental health and social media and calls for payments of up to about $18.59 billion, the company said. The operating margin fell to 20% from 40%. Diluted earnings per share were $3.83. Without the legal expenses, they would have been $7.40, Deadline reported.deadline.com+1

Chief Financial Officer Susan Li warned that more legal trouble may lie ahead. "We continue to see scrutiny on youth-related issues in several markets and have a number of youth-related trials scheduled in the coming months in the U.S.," she said, according to Deadline. Meta raised its full-year 2026 expense outlook to $175 billion to $179 billion. It also narrowed its capital spending range to $135 billion to $145 billion, the release showed.stocktitan.net+1

The company also announced a new class of non-voting Class C stock. It will be given to existing shareholders as a dividend, which works like a two-for-one stock split, and trading begins in January 2027, CNBC reported.cnbc.com

Muse passes 10 million users

On the earnings call, Mark Zuckerberg said more than 10 million people in the U.S. and Canada had set up Muse personal agents in about a month and a half. He said about 25% of them use it on any given day, according to a Benzinga transcript. Shopping is the most common use. More than a quarter of users shop through Muse, with an average purchase size above $200, TechCrunch reported.benzinga.com+1

Zuckerberg said Muse costs a lot of computing power to run right now. "We expect to improve its cost efficiency by more than 10x in the next year, which will enable it to be profitable once the revenue lines are at scale," he said, per TechCrunch.techcrunch.com

"Our investments are paying off, the core business is strong, and we're seeing velocity across the board," Zuckerberg said in the earnings release.prnewswire.com