Meta’s Q3 earnings miss EPS estimates amid $16 Billion tax hit and rising AI costs

Meta Platforms (META) reported its third-quarter earnings on Wednesday, exceeding revenue projections but falling short on earnings per share in regard to a huge one-time tax-related charge and climbing AI-related expenditures. After the announcement, Meta’s stock dropped more than 6% in after-hours trading.

Financial Performance

For Q3, Meta recorded earnings per share of $1.05 and revenue of $51.24 billion, surpassing analyst predictions of $6.72 EPS on $49.6 billion revenue, as per the Bloomberg consensus. The company primarily attributed the lower earnings to almost $16 billion one-time charge linked to the U.S. President Donald Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill. By not including this charge, Meta stated that its net income would have jumped from $2.71 billion to between $15.93 billion and $18.64 billion.