Meta’s Big Rally Spotlights Investors’ Questions About AI Returns

Shares of Meta Platforms stock soared 20% on Friday as investors applauded the company’s fourth-quarter results, which showed a strong ad recovery from its 2022 slump. But the enthusiasm of some investors was tempered by uncertainty about the returns Meta can get from the billions it is pouring into new generative artificial intelligence technology.

During Meta’s fourth-quarter earnings call on Thursday night, company executives said capital expenditures on expanding servers and data centers, along with the costs of operating that infrastructure, would both rise this year, at least partly because of AI tech development. Much of that spending is for open-source products, however, which doesn’t generate revenue for Meta. The most obvious near-term way for Meta to make money from AI is through the AI-infused advertising tools it is now pitching to marketers—but calculating the impact of that is “hard to impossible,” as New Street Research analyst Dan Salmon said in a report on Thursday.