Stephanie Link, chief investment strategist at Hightower Advisors, said Meta’s rise on Thursday after reports of job cuts was no surprise and should be the start of another bull run. Facebook’s parent company’s stock soared nearly 4% during trading hours after Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the matter, that CEO Mark Zuckerberg plans to cut the Metaverse unit’s budget by up to 30%. Bloomberg reported that the move includes job losses and is likely to impact the virtual reality sector. “This is what Zuckerberg is doing,” Link said Thursday on CNBC’s “Halftime Report.” META 1D Mountain Meta Platform, 1 Day Mr. Zuckerberg’s equation begins with the quarterly earnings report, in which he says the company will increase capital expenditures to accommodate increased spending next year, Mr. Link said. As a result, stock prices will fall. She said Mr. Zuckerberg then announced cost cuts in some parts of the business, which led to a recovery. Link said Reality Labs will burn through $19 billion this year and $24 billion next year. Thursday’s announcement shows Zuckerberg is being “more disciplined” with spending amid a shift in focus to artificial intelligence, she added. “He’s moving from hardware to AI to data centers,” Link said. “It’s very, very clear.” Zuckerberg needs to show he can continue to grow revenue while holding or expanding profit margins, Link said. Despite Thursday’s surge, the stock is still down about 20% from its high, he noted. Meta stock is up more than 13% in 2025, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index is up more than 21%. “We’ve been adding to it and we’ll continue to buy it,” Link said. “In my opinion, it should go much higher than this.” Wall Street agrees with Link. The average analyst surveyed by LSEG rates the stock a “buy,” with upside potential of over 25%. Joseph Terranova, senior managing director at Virtus Investment Partners, added that the departure of Apple’s head of user interface design, Alan Dye, to Meta is another positive sign. “Zuckerberg is incredibly competitive, and I think he showed that today,” Terranova said. “When he introduced Reality Labs in 2021, it probably didn’t go as planned, and I think this is an acknowledgment of that.”
