👉 Background: Meta is the company behind Facebook, which was started in a Harvard dorm room back in 2004. Since then, Meta (formerly known as Facebook) acquired Instagram and WhatsApp too. But Zuck loves to chase the next big thing.

• Facebook attempted to launch a digital currency called Libra,
• It doubled down on building the Facebook Metaverse
• It's focused on competing against OpenAI, Google and Anthropic for AI dominance.
  

👉 What happened: Now, Meta has announced revenue of $47.5 billion USD for its last quarter - up 22% year-on-year. And projected revenue for the upcoming quarter was also above analyst expectations. Next minute: share price up more than 9%.  

👉 What else: Meta says that AI is becoming a real revenue driver for the biz. In fact, Zuck wants everyone to have their own personal AI superintelligence… powered by Meta. While investors clearly liked the vision and the revenue growth, it means next-to-nothing if it’s not coupled with a growth in earnings too.

What's the key learning?

💡While revenue tells you how much a company made, earnings tell you whether they actually kept any of it. For example, Meta earned $47.5 billion in revenue this quarter.  

💡Earnings (also know as profit or net income), is what’s left after all the bills are paid. Think: staff wages, ad spend, R&D and those billion-dollar data centres. And, for investors, both metrics matter. In this quarter, Meta didn’t just grow revenue, it also grew earnings per share (EPS) by 38% and that was well above expectations.

💡So while Meta’s AI dreams are expensive, this quarter, at least, it looks like they’re starting to pay off. And for shareholders who were worried that AI was becoming a money pit, it’s a reassuring sign.